Joseph M. Weinstein

Nov 20,1952 - Jun 1, 2020

Joseph Weinstein had an extraordinary life. I hope you enjoy this recounting so much that you do some googling and find more joy in your life from his!

Joe was born in 1952 the fifth of seven children, in Cleveland Ohio, a good place to be from. He was spectacularly lucky to spend the early years enmeshed in nature, in the mini-jungle of a forest next door, with dense bushes for forts and trees to climb daringly. His father Marvin was a nuclear scientist and his mother Fay was one of the first female pathologists. They were prolific readers and idealists.

In 1963, his parents decided to move to Cuba or China to help humanity from the poverty-and-greatercommunal care perspective. Neither opportunity panned out, so they chose Kenya as a fresh start.

Joseph led his formative years, 12-19 in East Africa, where he was able to expand his awareness of beauty. This is in thanks to the existence of many places whose ambiance imposes a low limit on any visual aesthetic sensitivity in daily life. Every peek above that exposes a more dunning normalcy of mediocracy. In Kenya, in the vast untouched woods and plains, he found himself safely winning tests he set up, to find something beautiful and new in sight, rather than any however trivial ugliness. He transcended from an in-your-head competitive chess nerd to a rounder happier seeker.

His parents sent him back to the U.S. to get a college degree. He became an

Engineer and a Computer Scientist while enjoying his character-driven step-jobs as a house painter, furniture mover, bouncer in a bar, and personal attendant to quadriplegics.

He was very successful as a Computer Scientist, buoyed by his fantastic luck in marrying his wife, Leslie. He was able to be a successful martial artist and SCCA car racer.

He is a published philosopher of “The Axiomatic Self - A coherent architecture for modeling reality”. If you have an active open philosophical type of mind, his book may be an undiscovered gem of new ideas and happinesses.

He was an avid animal lover/communicator. He passed peacefully on June 1, 2020 after a courageous two-year battle with pancreatic cancer. Joe truly enjoyed life to the fullest every day that he spent with us.

He is survived by Leslie Green, his wife, daughter Rae (Matt Coleman) and son Max and also Betty, his dog. Due to the current Covid 19 pandemic Joe’s memorial service will be postponed until further notice.