Thomas Jean Morrison
This is a love story, and a life story. Tom and I have known each other since 6th grade when I transferred to school in his world of Carpinteria. We have always been friends but not girl and boy friend.
We attended different universities but majored in art and architecture. Our lives took different paths in different locations but we always knew where the other one was & what he or she was doing. We looked at each other with different eyes at our 50th high school reunion and began a terrific 20 year journey together at an age where most people don’t consider “New Beginnings”!
At first we couldn’t believe our compatibility. You like to camp? You enjoy hiking & biking? You relish exploring? Yes! Yes! We each discovered a new pal with whom to enjoy the outdoors in ways our previous spouses had rejected.
We quickly embarked on camping trips to Big Sur, the National Parks of Utah, Nevada, New Mexico, California and British Columbia and Alberta, following Tom’s formula of nights in lovely resorts interspersed with nights in a tent. We kayaked near the whales in Magdalena Bay and paddled through the Grand Canyon. Then we looked to the special wonders first discovered in our college History of Architecture classes and explored Petra, the Pyramids of Egypt, Angkor Wat, the shrines and temples of Japan.
Contemporary wonders were woven into our itineraries – Dubai, Singapore, I. M. Pei’s spectacular museum in Doha and his Miho Museum outside Kyoto, Naoshima and the art islands of Japan, Christo’s Gates in Central Park.
Tom was fortunate to make his passion his profession of architecture. An elementary school and a public library in Long Beach are projects from his early career, as were many homes and remodels from his middle life in Phoenix where he relocated. In the late 1970s, Tom and three partners rode the disco craze when, at the apex of the fad they were opening a new restaurant-bar-dance floor spot every three weeks throughout the United States and Canada. Their concepts were unique and fascinating. One place was dazzled with Tiffany glass, another with the stained glass from one of Boston’s earliest churches. The next decade marked a very different emphasis: after several hospital projects, Tom was the Project Manager for the Mayo Clinic’s new location in Scottsdale.
The desert was home to Tom and his family, but, always, his dream was to return to coastal California. That dream was realized in 2005 when the widower and the divorcee moved Into her family home on the Mesa bluffs.
In his kind and considerate manner, Tom didn’t criticize the remodel already underway with a different architect, but in his quiet an determined way added his ideas – a large triangular clerestory window that floods the house in light, and a stained glass window through which the sunset beams. Also, he decided that he would build the circular deck ‘called out’ by our landscape architect for the bluff edge, and in his generous way, let my son saw the last edges, so the project would feel like his, too.
This ocean deck became Tom’s favorite spot as we spent hours there with a book in our lap or binoculars to our eyes, reading, relaxing and watching the activities in the channel – gray whales migrating, dolphins jumping, pelicans flying in their enlarged V, container ships passing the islands, sailboats zipping by in a race & lobster fishermen pulling up their many traps. All of this is well documented by Tom’s legacy of terrific photographs, particularly the hundreds of sunsets from ‘his deck’.
A subtle leader, Tom was student body president in high school, and a track star with many blue ribbons who was invited to compete at the international level in the Games in Vancouver. He still holds the 100 yard dash record at Carp High.
Throughout his life, he has been a kind, decent man with a subtle sense of humor and unwavering integrity. Friends would share intimate parts of their lives because he was always trusted.
Goodbye, Tomcat. We love you. “We are forever thankful for our time together and all the memories.” “My favorite lefty!” “What a good man.” “So much love.” “Sweet funny Tom.”
His niece said, “He was that smiling uncle who was always kind & fun. Like my dad, Tom was a special person. I’m playing a concert tomorrow and at the rehearsal last night, I chose the piece to dedicate to Tom: Threnody by William Grant Still. Beautiful, sensitive but strong music – like Tom.”
Goodbye from your Partner, Nancy Brock and daughter, Courtney Miranda, and grandchildren, Celine Miranda, Zoe Brock, Inez Miranda and Robert Bishop and niece Marcy Stewart.
