It started out like a normal afternoon of a normal day. I picked up Sean at 230pm from school. Steven, the HR guy from Zenlayer, emailed me at 3pm. He wanted to talk. I emailed him back. I hoped Steven would ask me to fly down to meet them in their LA headquarters. I figured that is the next step in the process. I mean, we have to meet face to face before going further, right?

We ended up talking at 330pm. Steven was upbeat and surprised me: they wanted to offer me a job. I was so shocked I almost cried. I had been certain they would want to meet me in person. We had discussed salary in our first call and Steven confirmed everything is the same and asked if I was still open to that salary. Yes!

He suggested a few potential start dates and we agreed on Monday, October 21st. It worked out perfectly; my new boss would be flying up here to do some customer meetings. (He wanted to hire someone in San Francisco so he wouldn’t have to fly up here as often.) Since he was already coming up here, he could bring my laptop and any paperwork that wasn’t electronically available. Cool, they were coming to me! I would have been happy to fly down to LA but this is even better.

Looking back over the past 8 months, I see how much I had to change to get here. First, I’m super picky finding the next job. Possibly a little too picky, because I interviewed at more than two dozen companies. By the middle of September, I’m worried. I’m freaking out because my benefits were expiring at the end of October. My interviews had dried up with nothing else in the pipeline.

After talking to Tammy, I opened up my search area and included the South and West Bay. Even though that would mean a long commute, Tammy and I would make it work for our family. Zenlayer came immediately after our decision. It came so quick. After four phone calls in four days, I got the offer. I get to work remotely from home so the only time I have to commute is for client meetings in the Bay Area. Also, travel is maybe twice a year. Sweet. They really like it that I have over twenty years of tech experience. It’s a start up so I am excited about using the experience that I have to build it. I am very happy where I landed.

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Tammy:

It happened so quickly that it felt like a dream. Monday, Grant texted Sean and me and said he had a great interview with the recruiter for a sales engineer job. Tuesday, he texted again and said the interview with his potential boss went really well too. Wednesday, Grant texted that he just finished the interview with the Company Founder. The next day, he got a job offer. I cried. It was too good to be true.

I’m so amazed for many reasons. The moment we both figured out what was holding Grant back from getting a job, he got a job that has everything he wanted. He gets to play with cool technology. We can still do our 6:00 pm dinners together as a family because Grant’s office is our home. Travel is probably twice a year, which is rare for a sales engineer. Most importantly, Grant clicked with the people he will be working with, which hopefully means less drama.

Some people say that October is usually “disaster month”. I believe it because October was when Natalie got sick. In October 2017, we had the destructive wildfires in Northern California. Last week, there was the two day power outage that affected areas around us. This week, we had two earthquakes in Pleasant Hill. The first one, a 4.5 quake on Monday night around 10:30 p.m, rattled our house for a good minute. Besides our wooden kokeshi dolls falling on the floor, we were fortunate that no damage occurred. Jirachi was scared though and immediately went next to Grant. I was scared too.

Sean came into our bedroom and asked, “Was that an earthquake?” When we told him yes, he said, “Cool!” Then he went back to bed. I know now that if we ever experience a deadly earthquake, Sean will be oblivious to it all and our dog will die next to us.

The second earthquake of the week was a 3.4 magnitude quake on Wednesday afternoon, shortly after news broke out that there was an explosion at the Crockett fuel facility near us. A huge gray cloud of smoke hung over that area and could be seen for miles. The news advised people to seek shelter and stay indoors because of the potential hazardous toxins released in the air. I had thoughts that the world is ending. My thoughts have been here before many, many times. What I do is pray first, then go find something good to eat. That day it was a bunch of chocolate candy bars as Grant just bought a 5 lb bag of it from Costco for Halloween. I feel that those two things are important to do before I die.

Yet the world hasn’t ended yet for us. It still moves on and we get to experience joys like Grant’s job offer and where that journey will take us amidst the disasters of life. I am so nervous and excited for Grant!