Every New Beginning Comes From Some Other Beginning's End

~Semisonic (Closing TIme)

After a weekend filled with reminders of the past, and on the eve of my new adventures in the land of employment, I have a few thoughts to rummage through.

In the beginning...
Most people don't know this, but my parents own an office and school supply store near Willowbrook Mall. When we moved to Houston over 23 years ago, my parents opened this humble store in a little strip center at the corner of Jones and Grant. Over a decade later, we expanded (and for other messy lease negotiation issues) to our current location down the street. Well, Friday night, close to 12 years after the last time I stood on that specific geographic location, I was there again. The place is now a bar called Forgetta 'Bout It #1 - not the kind of bar I would ever go to, but there was a Battle of the Bands contest (semifinals), and Oliver's friend's band was performing (Parts Per Million - and they actually won!). Anyways, there's nothing particularly thrilling about this story, and it has nothing to do with the second half of this blog entry. It's just funny how things end up sometimes.

Speaking of coincidences and blasts from the pasts - Jonathan's friend Marty was in town for the weekend from San Antonio. I tagged along with them to various bars, restaurants, and museums. At one point, Marty planned to meet up with a friend named Pheobe. Turns out, it's Pheobe Rourke, someone I went to junior high and high school with (incidentally, she went to the 8th grade dance with Lee Pace). I'm starting to think that I'm on some kind of TV program like the Truman Show... and they're running out of actors.

The end of an era...
Friday was my last day as a South Capital Advisory Analyst for the JPMorgan Private Bank. I can't believe that it's been 2 1/2 years since the day I randomly saw the job posted online while in my 10,000th hour of surfing the web at UBS Warburg Energy (the sickly phoenix that emerged from the ashes of Enron). What can I say? It was my safe alternative to moving to Connecticut and being the slave to a handful of egotistical natural gas traders... but then again... all I did was jump from being an under-appreciated analyst in one multi-national financial institution to being an under-appreciated and underpaid analyst in another multi-national financial institution. I think most opinions are formed in hindsight, so I won't really know how I feel about my time at JPMC until more time has past. The only thing that is a given is that I will truly miss my co-workers. Alina - my partner in crime. It's rare to find someone you get along with well enough that it actually makes work more enjoyable to have them around. Thanks for experiencing the life of a capital advisory analyst with me - daily treks in the tunnels, collaborating on stupid presentations, and b*tching over Sametime about anything and everything. There are also so many other genuinely nice people that I worked with in every location that I will miss - Mary, Arlene, Nola, Valencia, Martha, Bob, Brad, Greg, David, Jeff, Jay, Carol, Susan, Julian, Georgiy, Ramon, BB, Steve, Jeff (Atlanta)... et al. I'll even miss the people that I didn't like as much (but we won't waste time naming names here). And then, of course, there is the sadness that comes with knowing that you will never get another questionable instant message from good ol' Oliver during regular business hours (now only Alina will have that privilege).

As with anything else in life - I wouldn't change a thing about my experience. Good or bad, it's all part of the journey. I will think about everyone more often than they will ever know - I wish them all the best in the future, and I'm sure our paths will cross again.

Sigh.

Time to find out what the future has in store for me...