Kris & Me: The Early Days
Kris and I were two young, OK not me so much as at 37 I was on the older side for Silicon Valley, Bay Area residents both working in the Hi-Tech industry. Being Computer Programmers we were making good money. Neither of us had much debt, Kris had a modest car payment and I had none. Neither of us had a mortgage and we both had reasonable rents. We had ample discretionary income. Being young, or youngish we engaged in multiple activities. We were out multiple evenings during the week and generally Friday and Saturday nights too. We did tend to stay in on Sunday evenings. We started sort of a tradition where Kris would steam some artichokes and bake some potatoes for dinner (I was a vegetarian back then) while we watched a favorite show of Kris's “Murder She Wrote” on her small 9 inch black and white portable TV in her studio apartment.
At Consilium, like many Silicon Valley companies, co-workers not only worked together but socialized together, especially smaller start-up companies like ours. Companies were fine with this and it made for a better more cohesive work place. Of course we combined our lives outside of work. I was now joining in activities Kris was involved in and she in mine. I like music, comedy, and theater. I would frequently go to comedy clubs and I had SF theater season tickets. I also liked to frequent local music venues. A couple of the plays I remember seeing with Kris were “Arsenic and Old Lace” with Marion Ross (Happy Days) and Gary Sandy (WKRP in Cincinnati) and “For Me and My Girl” staring Tim Curry (Rocky Horror). I also remember seeing Gilbert and Sullivan's “H.M.S. Pinafore” although we were quite tired from a long day and ended up leaving at the intermission, something I rarely do. Comedians we saw included Jake Johannsen, Dana Carvey, and Rob Schneider. We went to a smaller local music venue in San Jose to see this up and coming guy, Chris Isaak. I had read something about him where the writer was comparing him to Elvis. So Kris and I decided to go see him. We got there just as he was coming on. There were less than 100 people in the place, plenty of room and we sat down at a table along the side of the dance floor, which was mostly empty. He did kinda have the Elvis look. We both liked what we heard and of course Chris Isaak would make it big. He released his breakout album with the song “Blue Hotel” that spring.
I also had partial season tickets to the A's and season tickets to the SF ballet and Kris joined in to all of that as well. I'd been in the Bay Area for awhile at this point and had had multiple jobs and I had friends from my previous jobs and I had friends from my softball endeavors. Consilium was Kris's first job in the Bay Area and had moved there from Santa Cruz for the job so her social network was much more focused on our Consilium co-workers. We went out to eat a bit, and restaurants we liked to go to included Garibaldi's (our favorite at the time), All Season Cafe, and San Francisco Barbecue, which was a Thai BBQ place in Potrero Hill. We had a favorite breakfast place down in Menlo Park called “Late For The Train”.
We dressed up for the office Halloween party, did Thanksgiving up in Sacramento with Kris's family, and in December there was the company Holiday Party. The Consilium Holiday party was a fancy affair held at a hotel ballroom near the SF airport. I wore a suit, Kris wore a fancy new dress, and we arrived from my place in my fancy Nissan pickup truck. It was a very windy night. When we got to the place I went to drop Kris off at the front door. She opened the car door, the wind was behind us, and the door ripped out of her hand. The wind was so strong that the force of it bent the door hinge so that we couldn't close the door. We spent the next twenty minutes working to bend it back to get the door closed. We never did get it all the way back but we got it enough so it was at least partially latched so we could go inside and drive it back to our places afterward.
Jon (founder and president of Consilium) hired the top dance band in SF for the affair, The ZaZu Pitts Memorial Orchestra. They specialized in old R&B, Soul, and MoTown songs. There were like 15 members of the Orchestra, horns, saxophones, guitars, female singers and dancers. I had previously attended a number of their shows in the city and I had a couple of their albums. It was great to have them all to ourselves for the night. It's still my favorite Company Holiday event of my working career.
I was still coaching a women's softball team in SF (The Irving Club) as well as playing on a Men's softball team. Kris started coming to my games and she also joined the Irving Club team I was coaching. Kris was going to be one of the best players on the team plus my former girlfriend Heidi had been on that team. Kris was destined to play a premium position as well as take a premium position in the batting order. With Kris joining the team, I decided that it would probably be better if I switched roles with Ken, who was the assistant coach. So he took over being the head coach while I moved into the assistant coaching role. Everyone on the team could see that Kris was skilled and was a top player. They were all happy to have her. Heidi, understandably, decided not to continue playing. She was not likely to play anyway with me being there but it probably didn't help that both Kris and I were with the team. That women's team was a very strong team. We had a number of very good players on it.
A couple of times my men's softball team in SF, “The Other Guys” was a “man” short for a game. Our leader, Ken, the same guy coaching the Irving Club had Kris fill in. Kris not only held her own but she made a notable play in each game. The first one she was playing right field. There was a guy on second and the batter hit the ball out to right. The runner on second was not exactly a fast runner but after looking back and seeing Kris out in right, he tagged up to go to 3rd after she caught the ball. I was pitching and so it was my responsibility to back up any throws coming in from the outfield. I knew Kris had a strong arm, stronger than mine anyway, and I also knew she would throw to 3rd after the catch. So I backed up 3rd. I could see on the runner's face he expected to cruise into 3rd. As he approached 3rd Kris's throw came in over his left shoulder right to our third baseman on the fly. His eyes got wide as he never expected it. He was easily tagged out. His team's whole bench stood up and applauded. The other game, Kris was again in the outfield. We were playing on a city softball field. In the city, San Francisco, it was common to have two fields in the same park where the outfields backed up to each other. A well hit long fly ball could bled into the opposing field's outfield every now and then. It didn't happen too often as it had to be quite a poke. Anyway, someone on the other field really got a hold on one. At about the same time a batter at our field hit a long fly out to Mark, our outfielder who was playing next to Kris. As Mark maneuvered to catch the ball coming from our field he got hit in the back of the head by the ball from the other field and he went down. Kris who was racing over to backup Mark, saw Mark get hit and fall to the ground. She got there just in time to jump over Mark and catch the ball. It was the play of the day. By the way, while Mark was a little stunned, he was OK, but Kris probably saved him from being hit a second time.
I would get invited to play on a number of co-ed softball teams but I knew who they really wanted was Kris.
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