I've a copy of my first-grade effort at writing comedy about "Mrs. Goose"; today, it's jibberish. I treasure copies of my second grade's weekly paper, "The Champion City News", for the month when I was Editor. My junior-high term paper on Tibet is loaded with newspaper clippings of the demise of Pathet Lama, the Red Chinese invasion and the rise of the Dalai Lama, a child at the time.

As a language major in college, my head reeled with words, semantics, syntax and literature in English, Spanish and French. I pumped out papers on obscure Cuban cross-dressing, homosexual poets(i.e., "El exoticismo en la poesia de Julian del Casals")and co-ghostwrote monthly underground anti-college administration essays. Advanced studies in languages yielded two more word-laden degrees; how people learn second languages became my specialization.

Six decades as a language student or professor equals a lifetime of reading, speaking, listening and writing, the latter being the basis on which universities retain or boot you. I was retained. Having my work included in a volume with Dr. Margaret Mead's work when I was thirty-two didn't hurt my tenure application.

For the past two years, I've been writing about my youth, growing up in a small town in Western New York. Several have been published; more are in draft. Cancer prompted me to get hustling on the writing of a series of autobiographical essays. Next is a "recollection collection" of trips and overseas assignments with an emphasis on people met and a memorable moment or two.

Below are links to these more recent efforts. Professional articles can be found via the "VITAE" link.

F. L. Jenks----