No followers :) .. Avril's "I'm With You" strikes a chord..

So .. no one to know I'm a closet Avril fan based on the "No followers" tag! So much the better..

Seriously, even as someone who has his eldest son to blame why Avril's music is on my iPhone (but that doesn't explain the play count), it's pretty wild when they strike a philosophical chord in my current situation.

Here I am, T-4 days before my return to a startup and it's natural expectations, I fear higher than those of my past employer, and I see truth in her (and her writer's) words. From "I'm with you":

"It's a damn cold night

Trying to figure out this life
Won't you take me by the hand
Take me somewhere new
I don't know who you are but I
Im with you"

By: Avril Lavigne and The Matrix (Scott Spock, Lauren Christy, Graham Edwards)

So.. having endured good times at my past employer but also a notable amount of frustration, I now find myself in the interregnum between employers remembering the good and fearing the bad to come. What awaits me, from a glass is nearly empty standpoint :), is joining a successful team as an also-ran without relevant skills to be an expert in market or technology and living in the shadow of a team of leaders that turned two years of failure around in half-over again that time.[1] To negate the line from the end of Spinal Tap, "I DON'T envy us.".

But still .. in the song, with the melody of a waltz (I wonder what Len Goodman would say to using it as a backdrop in Dancing with the Stars) .. there is a hint of hope in this leap of faith. I will be going somewhere new and the Rubicon is crossed (my last reference to the river.. promise!). Still, as Avril sang in her next track, "Everything is changing". I must admit, as a dinosaur with 3 kids and mortgage, I guess I'm not "A Mobile" as the song continues.

Still and all, looking forward rather than backed and thankful for the opportunities placed before me. I typically underestimate myself and I know I have skills and knowledge to bring to bear .. the query before me is if they will be seen as such through my naturally obtuse communication style :(. I'm, of course, expecting this to be so else I would not have cross the not-to-be-named-again river in the first place. In any case, it will be nice to work with an excellent team and I certainly will be learning almost continually.

I'll next see you all (none, by my count :) ), after my first day. For now, I'll enjoy this night -- a little chill but otherwise a great evening to blog from the deck.

-George

[1] Less artfully, it seems a re-architecture process languished over 2 years and then was started anew and successfully reached beta with an entirely new codebase in 1 year.

Ok .. not really a dinosaur or at least a late period one ..

Over the years I've tended to work at smaller companies and they grow being acquired, merging, etc. In a couple of weeks I'm returning to the 30-person or less, startup world after 7 years at a large corporation's "Digital" division. I'm 45 or so and it occurred to me to write this as I don't feel particularly like "Old Man Withers" and yet the debate on the requisition to replace me at one point talked of years of experience and thought a 35-year-old would be good. Ignoring this unintended agism I also considered the talk of "culture-shock" I'm told I will experience.

So ... I thought perhaps I'd chronicle my extremely-lower-case adventure.

PS: I'll shoot for far more eloquence and depth in the future but figured if I didn't strike while the iron is hot and start up this page then I'd have an even greater excuse not to write it. ;)