Change is in the Air - Back to the Bay Area
After my LA adventure it was nice to be back in the Sacramento office just managing the software staff there. However, I was beginning to question my situation. My job was just OK and the only options were to move further up in management, which I had little interest in doing, or to move down to programming again. Moving down might have been an option but programming in a one of a kind language was going to limit my options for future programming positions plus GBS couldn't, or maybe that's wouldn't, pay me as just a programmer. I was beginning to realize that I would likely have to become a COBOL programmer, the language all the top Computer Science majors, including myself, made fun of back in college. The longer I waited to do this the harder it was going to be, as I would need to start in a lower level position. GBS was looking at moving to a UNIX platform, an operating system I really liked, but it had not happened yet and with the rapid advances in the industry it was more likely their computers would become non-competitive shortly and the programming language they were using would become a dead end. I started thinking maybe I should look for a new job.
I'd been back for a couple of weeks when my long time friend Larry came up from San Francisco for a visit. I met Larry when we were stationed together in the Air Force and we'd been great friends ever since. Larry and I decided to go out for a couple of beers but Kathy decided to just stay home. We were gone for almost two hours and when we returned Kathy greeted us with a less than friendly “your late for dinner” announcement. It was around 7:00 and her announcement took me by surprise. I was not aware that dinner had been scheduled for a particular time. Maybe Kathy told us and I didn't listen. She went on to say she burnt the dinner while waiting for us. Larry and I looked at each other. I wanted to ask “Why'd you burn the dinner just because we were not back yet? Why not just take it out of the oven when it was done and then we could have reheated it?” Instead I said I was sorry. But then I blew it. I asked how could we be late when we never discussed what time we would return? I know I should not have said that and I should have been more sympathetic but I was taken aback at how upset she was. Kathy stormed off to bed. I came to find out later that Kathy was jealous of my friendship with Larry and she would find a reason to be upset with me any time he visited. It was true Larry and I had a lot of history together and our banter could make someone feel left out. Still he was my good friend. I'd know him a long time. I didn't feel I should have to give him up or act differently with him.
Seeing Larry reminded me how much I missed the Bay Area. I hadn't made any new friends in Sacramento and frankly Sacramento itself seemed rather dull. Downtown seemed to close down on the weekends. I began to realized that I just wasn't happy. I couldn't say for sure exactly why that was but I knew that I wanted to go back to being a programmer as well as move back to the Bay Area. I talked with Kathy about it. The pay for programming is less than managing but the pay is good enough and I found it so much more enjoyable. Kathy wasn't sure about my leaving GBS. She knew I was highly regarded there and seemed to be concerned that I would be starting all over again in a new company, which would be true. Even so, she was mostly supportive probably because she was not happy with her job and missed the Bay Area as well. I needed a change and given my desire to return to the Bay Area it was an easy decision. I decided to tell Bob Monday morning that I was going to resign.
I decided I should talk with Mike about it first. I ran into him in the hallway on the way to his office. He was coming to see me so we went back to my office. Mike told me he had a new job and was leaving GBS. He said he wanted to tell me first and was going to tell Bob after he left my office. I said “Oh no! I was planning to quit this morning too.” We both laughed. We talked about how we felt we couldn't just both leave Bob at the same time. I couldn't do that to Bob especially after what we'd both been through down in LA. Mike already had a new job lined up with a start date. I told Mike I hadn't even begun to look for one so I would wait a few weeks. Three or four weeks after Mike left on another Monday morning I walked into Bob's office and asked to talk with him. I turned and closed his door. Bob looked at me and said “Oh shit, you're resigning too aren't you?” I told him I was but would stay until he found a replacement. He asked me if I had found a new job. I told him I hadn't but I wanted to return to the Bay Area and was confident I'd find one fairly quickly. Bob said he had a friend who owned a small software consulting firm in Santa Clara and he'd call him and tell him he should hire me. A few days later I got a call from Jon Siegel the owner of Siegel Software. He asked me to meet with me. We met and talked and he offered me a position. I told Bob and he said I could leave at the end of the following week.
Kathy had quit her job the previous week and spent that week down in the Bay Area looking for a place to live. She found a nice little house in Sunnyvale on Selo Drive. (Now there's an appropriate California town name.) The only problem was the landlord was not very open to us having a dog at his property. That weekend I drove down to look at the house with Kathy. I brought Nyshia with us. When we got to the house I took Nyshia out of the car. I walked her to the front door and put her in a sit and stay. The landlord came out and looked at Nyshia. He said he didn't want her to come in the house and didn't look too happy. I said “That's not a problem”. I put Nyshia in a sit and stay and just Kathy and I went in. We went through all the rooms, talked about rent, responsibilities, etc. We were in the house for a good 20 minutes. When we walked back out the front door there was Nyshia still sitting on the front stoop. The landlord was impressed and reached down and pet Nyshia. He remarked what a great dog she was. He looked at me and said he'd allow her to live in the house but only her. No other pets of any kind. We signed the lease right there.
Of course, that meant we had to re-home Gucci, our other dog since we were not going to be able to take him with us. I had kind of figured that was going to be the case and Kathy was fine with that. I had some friends from the Air Force who lived down in San Joaquin Valley and they agreed to take him in.
We packed up and moved to Sunnyvale and were now back in the Bay Area. Kathy had found a new job. I was to start my new job with Siegel on Monday. I was happy to be out of managing and to just be a programmer again. Things seemed to be looking up.
I talked with Bob a few times after that but soon lost track of him. I never saw him again. I did run into Mike years later while working at Caltrans. Mike was their Sun Microsystems rep. They were good people and I have good memories of working with them.
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