S.H. Oden was born in Spokane, WA. in 1953, and was taken to Mexico by his mother at the age of 5 for 13 months after the split-up of his parents. The family re-assembled later in Spokane valley for ten years before splitting up again. Oden emigrated to Australia for three years, first living in Melbourne, Victoria for four months, and subsequently moved to Darwin, Northern Territory in the tropics for the remainder of his stay in Australia. In the Territory, he survived a near-death experience with crocodiles in the Daly River of ‘Crocodile Dundee’ fame, spent a night on Ayer’s Rock in the outback interior, and flew twice with the Royal Flying Escort Service escorting psychiatric patients to treatment facilities in southern Australia.

Like an old salmon returning to spawn, Oden went back to the Pacific Northwest with his Australian wife to settle down and start a family. He landed a psychologist position with Idaho Health and Welfare, which he kept for 28 years working in psychiatric rehab and forensics. Over time he was awarded the Presidential Bronze Award from the Bush administration in 2006 for his relief work in Albania, Uganda, and Mexico.