I am a male of European ancestry approaching 50 years of age. I live in the region of the United States known as the Pacific Northwest. I am very happily married to a wonderful woman, and each of us brought to the relationship a child from a previous relationship. The two youngsters (both now in college) have become great friends; in fact, all of us get along very well almost all of the time. A loving family home constitutes a whopping portion of what I consider to be “success”.
Regarding the logo: ‘Way back when I was in high school, I wrote an editorial column for our school newspaper. (Very) loosely based on Art Buchwald’s brilliant satire, I poked fun at everything from the school board to the guidance counselors to the cheerleaders. I even conjured up a mythical, Nyquil®-powered computer that was responsible for creating our intensely frustrating, endlessly-fascinating class schedules. This is many years before cold remedies were used to make methamphetamine and still ranks as my most prophetic statement ever.
It was my Dad that proposed we call the column “Straight from the John” and the name, well, stuck. I even had a t-shirt made using the logo Dad thought up. Yep, you guessed it: the very logo on this page. Suffice it to say that my initials are “JP” (as you may have gathered from the logo). I bet you can guess my first name. That’s right: “The”.
I am a programmer and systems analyst by trade. Over my 25+ year career, I’ve worked on–and led–all phases of developing computer applications, from proof-of-concept through design and construction, then support, and finally retirement. I’ve always prided myself on providing good value to my customers and my company in whatever capacity I worked in. My regular work gig–up until a few months ago–involved helping maintain some of Hewlett-Packard’s internal computer systems. I didn’t do the support myself; I just made sure the right issues were getting the attention they deserved and, on the good days, designed and implemented better support processes. I’d been in the role for more than a year and the job requirements were accelerating faster than my ability to keep up with them. I found that there wasn’t time to do the kind of job that I need to do in order to fulfill my sense of professionalism. The sense that I was always falling further and further behind triggered a lot of stress, and eventually with that stress came headaches, anxiety attacks, and a whole host of other issues. It all got to be much too much and the only practical thing that I could do–after all attempts to change the situation or adapt to it had been exhausted–was to resign. The relief was both profound and immediate.
In truth, I really wasn’t as bold as you might think: change was coming to my work life anyway within the next year or so. HP had decided that the local site would not house any information technologists starting sometime in 2009–so to keep my job, I would have had to move to Texas. Nope. No way. Not gonna happen. My roots here run deep: all my family is in Oregon, Washington and California. Beyond the family ties, I love life in Oregon: we get four seasons here, but we don’t get too hot and/or humid for very long in the summer, nor do we get long stretches of frigid winter temperatures. We do get lots of cloudy days and lots of light rain–but the flip side to that is how green and lush we are all year ’round.
So with a boost from my wife and kids, I marshaled my resources, secured a year’s worth of funding for the kids’ college educations, and set about looking for a new gig. Something where I could work hard and feel that it matters. Meanwhile, I took a little time for myself, did some writing, spent time with my family, and watched the clouds float across the Arcadian skies of the Pacific Northwest summer.
In August, I took a new role doing systems analysis and programming with Oregon State University’s Information Systems department. I get to work with a great group of people and the job itself is fantastic. My lovely wife is closing in on her Licensed Massage Therapist certification (just one more test to go!) and she will be looking for a new job, too. Both kids are doing well in their respective courses of study.
As for me, I’m trying to teach myself how to work and live at a pace that feels right to me. Not the frenzied, balls-to-the-wall pace of my last HP job, but not slowing to a crawl, either. I believe that everyone has an internal metronome that governs how fast we move; the trick is to recognize the signs that you’re speeding or impeding and taking the sometimes tough steps necessary to get back “on beat.” There are a lot of components to this process, and the learning and the journey are what this blog is all about.
Life is good.
