You’d think that getting a great job offer after ten weeks of unemployment would be great. You would think that. Turns out you’d be wrong.
The past ten weeks have stripped me of my confidence, stripped me of my trust in my inner voice. It is so hard not to think that the only common factor in all the jobs I applied for and didn’t get is me. My inner voice has started to question and doubt everything I say or do. I know better and yet I can’t help but give in to the fear, uncertainty, and doubt that is currently giving lectures in my head.
Ten weeks of rejection, of self doubt, of self recriminations have left me incapable of processing the offer that was made to me this afternoon. The position is a dream job in terms of its technical focus and duration. I would be challenged to expand my broad development base into new areas of application architecture. It is the kind of job I’ve always said I’ve wanted.
Only now that it’s been offered to me, I find myself wanting to reject the offer. When I think about accepting it I get sick to my stomach and my hands get shaky. Since I no longer trust my inner voice after weeks of getting nowhere, how can I trust it now?
Should I ignore my trepidation and take the job and hope for the best? After all, if I can’t trust my inner voice any more, what it is telling my about this job is wrong. Or should I listen to it now that I’ve gotten an offer? After all there were doubts in my mind about this position before the offer was made. Those concerns haven’t (yet) been addressed.
I want so desperately to make the right choice, to do the right thing, that I am afraid of doing anything. Our money is growing short, our time is running out. If I turn my back on this offer I am risking everything on getting a new offer that I can accept.
I know that I feel out of control right now. Events have left me in a precarious position and I don’t like having to make a choice because it’s the only option left to me. I need to find some way to gain control of this situation again, even if it is only illusory control during the transition to what ever is next.
Just having identified that I must do something to regain control, or the feeling of control, is helping me to feel better now. It is late and I am utterly spent and exhausted. Hopefully dumping all of these thoughts here will keep them out of my head long enough for me to fall asleep.
This morning I had the most intense and rigorous interview of my twenty year career. The gentleman on the other end of the phone was very up front about needing to vet me, and how he was going to achieve that. The thirty minutes left me excited and drained at the same time.
This afternoon I was called back and offered the job. This will be a challenge for me, forcing me to expand my knowledge and abilities tremendously. Everything about this situation is coming together nicely, and we are almost certain that it is the right thing for us to do next.
Almost certain.
It requires moving about 300 miles further west. We’ll be that much farther from all of Michele’s friends and family. In particular the additional distance from her mom will be hard. Today we are two long days drive away, with the added milage it’ll be next to impossible to drive. Flying will work, but the idea of being farther away is not one that makes either of us happy.
I did pass on an interview already scheduled for Thursday of this week; in light of this offer the second position paled to insignificance. I think I handled the telephone call to cancel the interview well. I didn’t burn the bridge.
The final potential offer I have may or may not come to pass. My name and resume have been submitted and I am justing waiting to hear if I am awarded the contract. Financially the two positions are about equal. The contact would be local, and that would save us the move, and avoid the whole distance issue for a time anyway. The local contact is less stable, and not nearly as challenging technically for me.
So I am left with comparing an apple in the hand with an orange that I may not even get. One is a great career move, a career move that isn’t likely to come my way again. The other allows me to focus more on friends and family, it would be saying to the world that my career is nice, but is not the prime factor for my happiness.
I have a couple of days before the written offer lands in my mail box. If I hear about the local contact before the end of the week, Michele and I will have to make a difficult decision. One based on emotional needs and practical realities. In this moment I can even see passing on both opportunities and manufacturing one elsewhere that might meet more needs altogether. Having an offer in hand is very confidence inspiring.
So, like Alice, we are into the rabbit hole, not knowing where it leads or what wondrous adventures we’ll have before reaching the bottom.
Or ‘There and Back Again in 22 Hours’
In anticipation of a phone interview Monday morning, Michele and I decided to visit Kansas City on Saturday. KC is the location of one prospective opportunity and, since it is only 5 hours away by car, we wanted to have a quick look see before I had my interview.
Little did we know that the next 22 hours would be so, ah, interesting.
Our trip started out smoothly enough. We have for some time maintained a travel bag, with duplicates of our basic toiletries, et cetera, so we were off in a matter of minutes. Along the way we had a great conversation about the pluses and minuses of each of the three hottest prospects coming our way.
As we were navigating the highway interchange between I-270 and I-70 West on the outskirts of St. Louis we both noticed that the air in the car was getting warmer and warmer. The A/C was working as we could feel cold air trickling out of the vents, but either the fan had quit or a hose a come off, as there was no real force behind the air. Fiddling with the controls elicited an ominous thump sound from inside or underneath the car.
We turned around and made our way to the nearest St. Louis Lexus dealer, Plaza Lexus. Mind you this is a Saturday morning in the Midwest, most automotive dealers in this part of the world have service hours Monday through Friday only. Also keep in mind that we had purchased our pre-owed LS 430 from non-Lexus dealer, and we had never before graced the service department of Plaza before.
In less than 30 minutes our car had been diagnosed enough to know that the right side of the dash needed removing to get at the climate control duct work. Apparently a flap of some sort was jammed or broken in the wrong position. We had an appointment scheduled for first thing Monday morning. And just so we wouldn’t be inconvenienced, we had a 2003 LS 300 to use, free of charge until our car was ready Monday afternoon. Try that at your local Ford dealer, I dare you.
With no further difficulties we made our way across Missouri to Kansas City. Along the way we saw signs for free wireless internet access at any number of motels in and around the KC metropolitan area. We chose to stop at the first one we came to, Sleep Inn of Blue Springs, simply because it was first, and it was on the east side of town; making our departure on Sunday that much easier.
We netted a corporate rate thanks to the generosity of the desk man and were soon in our room preparing to explore the city. Wanting to test the Wi-Fi setup I unpacked my PowerBook only to discover no signal. Stopping and restarting the Airport didn’t work, nor did restarting the whole computer. I moved the machine around all four walls getting no signal at all. Opening the hallway door and stepping outside the room got me a very weak signal.
So going down the hall to the front desk ( where by the way the signal was very strong ) I asked about my difficulty. My buddy with the corporate discount insisted that the signal worked fine all the way to the end of the hall, several rooms past where we were staying. In the end he was unhelpful.
We left the room and spend several hours driving around KC ending up at a Sweet Tomatoes for dinner. Back in our room with hours to kill before bedtime I again tried the WiFi access with no luck. Discount-boy down the hall said, “Hey, it’s free, what do you want?”
I wanted to hit him. Free? Not hardly. I was paying $55 to NOT have free wireless internet service in my room. To add insult to injury the television had occasional fits of interference that washed the screen with a solid red tint. Oh, in addition the weak-kneed A/C in the room was fighting a losing battle against the 85 degree outside temp. And the bed was lumpy and equipped with sheets that refused to stay on the mattress.
We left the room about 2 am, figuring if we couldn’t drive the 5 hours home before collapsing, we’d sleep more comfortably in the car on the way. Taking turns we did make it home in less than 5 hours. Got to sleep in our own bed. Nice.
Final score: Lexus - all the points, Sleep Inn - Zero.
P. S. We liked Kansas City enough to make it doable. The biggest minus is that is would be an oasis, there isn’t anything nearby to go see. If KC didn’t have it, we’d have to go for hours to get it. It also makes getting home to Michele’s mom impossible without flying or driving two long days.
There has been some activity lately concerning my employment. Not wanting to jinx anything I haven’t written about it here, however, the lack of release from not writing is getting to me.
After nine weeks of unemployment I am definitely ready to return to work. Just about any work will do, thank you. I have prospects locally, five hours west of here in Kansas City, and 4 hours north in Janesville.
The local prospects include two positions that I would like to have, and one that I’ll take if offered. The best part about any of the three is that staying here keeps all of our moving options open. The minute I take a position that requires a move, we lose all of the the options.
The Kansas City position is the best in terms of duration and perhaps pay. It would also be a good enhancement to my skill set. Neither Michele or I has any knowledge of Kansas City to base our decision upon however. I do have a phone interview early next week that I hope will spawn a face-to-face interview. That would give us an excuse to go look it over. For all intents and purposes we moved to Vancouver and Charleston blind, and we don’t want to do that again if we can avoid it.
The Janesville option is moving along rather quickly. I have several phone conversations and a meeting with an account manager from the consulting firm. It appears that I’ll be getting a face-to-face interview with the client next week.
Michele is still waiting on her Chapel Hill opportunity to make up their minds. When she interviewed there they indicated the new funding would be available in six to eight weeks. It has now been four weeks. If I take either remote opening she loses this chance altogether. That would be hard for both of us to live with at some level. My hope is that I can delay making a choice for as long as possible to give her prospect time to make a decision.
One saving factor is that the Janesville consulting firm is the largest consulting firm in the country. They have offices everywhere. Should Michele be offered the position in Chapel Hill, I am certain I could work with this firm there to find a job quickly.
We are both excited about the recent activity here, and looking forward to the events of next week. I feel my confidence returning, and for the first time in a long time I feel like I will get out of this slump with a better job than I had before.
Michele and I enjoyed our first swim of the season today. The pool water has been clearer every day since Thursday, and the air temps have been in the middle to upper eighties. I flipped the heater on Thursday morning with the water temp hovering around 66 degrees. By that evening the water was a toasty 86 degrees.
Friday was out as we were celebrating my birthday with dinner out on my parents. But today was another story. After helping a friend drop a new pool liner in his above ground this morning I came home and vacuumed the bottom and sides of ours. About 2:00 o’clock we slipped into our suits and jumped in for ninety minutes of bliss.
It has been a long seven months since we were last in the water in September. And we had missed it. We’re both pleasantly tired this evening, but already looking forward to another dip tomorrow.
Some fun in the summer sun.
This week’s coverage of the torture and abuse of prisoners in Iraq sickens me. That the ordinary citizens of Iraq are likening the occupying United States force to Saddam Hussien is a damning indictment.
President Bush’s weak apology to the families of the tortured was embarrassing for me as a citizen of the United States. Secretary Rumsfeld’s arrogance and hubris about the entire situation in Iraq in general, and this most recent revaluation in specific is an indication of how out of control this “war” in Iraq has gotten.
I am reminded of the scene in “Gandhi” at the salt plant where the British beat down row after row of unarmed men as they approach the gates. The line that keeps ringing through my head is delivered by Martin Sheen, “What ever moral ascendancy the British held was lost here today.”
The razor thin moral argument for regime change in Iraq has been lost with the acts of barbarity, inhumanity, and cruelty by the United States towards the people of Iraq. Now, maybe, we the people of the United States can stand up and speak out to affect regime change here at home by removing the Bush war machine from power.
Forty-three things about me in honor of my Forty-Third birthday:
We have a pool. A nice in-ground pool. 29 x 13 feet, heated, fiberglass, hubba-hubba pool.
Our neighbor has maple trees. Maple trees are bad. Maple trees make maple seeds. Billions and billions of seeds.
As a child I loved these seeds as they were primitive helicopters, spinning slowly to the ground. My parents had a single red maple tree that produced these seeds. I played with them for hours.
As an adult I have declared war on these SEEDS OF MASS DESTRUCTION.™
My neighbor has about 47 billion maple trees. Okay, maybe not that many, but the six or eight or 52 thousand trees that he does have produce about 47 billion seeds.
Every day.
Really.
We’ve got so many of these seeds of destruction on our driveway that the seams in the concrete are outlined by the tails standing up. In a few days I will have to ascend to the roof, leaf blower in hand, to empty the gutters of billions and billions of the seeds, lest they germinate and I have maple shoots on my roof.
Our pool, naturally, is a magnet for these miracles of of reproductive genius. At least twice a day I have to empty several thousand refugees from the neighbor’s trees from the skimmer basket. Netting them off the pool surface is Sisyphian task; no sooner do you get to the last net’s worth of seeds than the wind blows and several zillion more are spiraling gracefully down into the water.
I. Hate. Maple. Seeds.
Anyone out there got a chain saw they’d like to loan me on a dark night?
I know that most people celebrate Cinco de Mayo, but myself, I’m into Siete de Mayo. Specifically the one 43 years ago.
That’s right, in just two days I’ll be a whopping 43 years young. If I live to be 86 I’m middle aged. Three of my four grandparents made it to 90, so I figure I’ve got a couple more years yet before the long downhill slide. Or not.
All I want this year for my birthday is a job. Nothing fancy please, Just 9 to 5. Maybe a lunch break. Some light coding, maybe a application design or two. Put a big red bow on it and I’m there.
This entry is the three-hundred-ninety-seventh posting to my site. The oldest dates back to December of 1999. We were living in Vancouver Washington then, enjoying the mild climate of the Pacific Northwest.
A lot has happened in the intervening four years, two major cross-country moves, jobs lost and found, and lost yet again. The tiny seeds of spirituality inside of me have germinated and grown. The relationship with my beautiful wife has blossomed and has continued to be the most profound aspect of my life.
I written of hopes and sorrows, good foods, and high technology here. This site has become a touchstone of my life. I turn here when I have need of expressing my inner self. Knowing that it can be read by anyone, and not knowing who is reading it, is the point. This is my form of confession, and you the reader are the priest.
So thank you dear reader, though your unknown eyes I have seen myself more clearly.