Interviews

I had a couple interviews last week. The first was at a company in the southish bay which models electricity generation, distribution and sale in wholesale electricity markets. In a loosely structured format, I talked with one person and then another, took an Excel spreadsheet test and a writing test, and chatted with other people who happened to be around. I loved the work environment and the main drawback would be the commute. The second was at a regional agency in charge of air quality. I thought from the job description (and this was pretty much confirmed in the interview) that they wanted someone more senior than I, but I thought I'd at least go there, see what it's like, meet people, get my name known, etc. No such luck. Here the interview process was tightly controlled by HR: a 40-minute writing test followed by a 40-minute interview with three people asking six prewritten questions. I got no chance to meet people, find out what working there is like, whether there may be other positions opening up more suited to me, etc. Everyone was friendly enough, but there wasn't much point to my going there. Perhaps the only positive aspect of it is that I know I can expect my rejection in about three weeks, whereas at the first place there was only a vague "yeah, you should come in and meet the president, who's at home today dealing with a burst sewer, and let us know what your salary requirements are". But, still, I hope it comes through.

Revisiting

A few months ago, I wrote the following draft for a post, after a series of visits to Berkeley and Oakland.

Whispering Ghosts

I spent summers age four to twenty one in a small Cape Cod town. By the time I spent my last summer there, now many years ago, the collective weight of memories made there felt stifling. I felt some mix of anger, resentment, and pain about the place in which I had, over the years, had so much fun. Maybe it's that, by that last summer, I had so far reached the bitter end of summer life there, after most of my friends had left to do other things, I was mourning the lost childhood idyll. At the time, however, it felt like the ghosts of the past were gibbering ever louder in my ears, clouding conversations with people actually present. Every place I in which I found myself was a place I had been hundreds of times before, with many different people or alone, making the air dense with personal history. I don't think I ever psychically escaped so much as I physically stopped going there.

Recently, I have noticed having similar feelings while making trips to the East Bay. I cannot pass anywhere, it seems, without remembering something, often many things, which happened there some number of years ago. A group of friends, a girlfriend or crush, a restaurant which used to be there, an academic triumph or failure. All these things come to mind and crowd out my actually being there at the time, although perhaps in a subjective sense my memories help make the place and time what it really is. These memories are not ghosts; they are I, and I will listen this time.

On subsequent visits, I tried that - the listening, that is. Suddenly, those voices whispering from behind my ears, just out of view, fell silent. Once engaged, they vanished, and I was left not alone exactly, but more fully there.

J turns 0.5 years old

J had a couple new experiences today, his six-month birthday. He went into the North Beach swimming pool, continually held by L, of course. And we gave him a little bit of "solid" food. The pool he seemed a little nonplussed by, as he was already a bit tired. On the walk home, he completely conked out. The "solid" is in quotes because it was rather liquid rice cereal. He's been really eager to have some of whatever we're having for a while, but we'd been told to wait at least until he was six months old. He liked the rice cereal, but the spoon was confusing and frustrating for him. Not bad for a first try, though.