JediWright.com

I haven’t done a list in I don’t know how long, so here’s one for 2009, recognizing my top ten, notable events:

• I got to see a woman/my partner/Tristan give birth to our first child and son Lee, born (1.24.09)
• I completed yet another phase of build-out at the first house I’ve helped build from scratch
• I got to see Lamb play live
• My immediate family got together, including my sister and bro-in-law from Spain (who got to meet Lee); last time was some years ago
• Made my first trip to Ireland
• Flew solo with Lee back to PA for a quick family visit
• Moved back to Los Angeles, California
• Helped navigate my Internet fabric company through treacherous economic waters, coming out ahead, out of debt and on track for renewed profitability
• Lee: rolled over, crawled, stood up, took his first steps, started “talking”, along with a multitude of other firsts
• Discovered some interesting truths about myself through some very heavy introspection

2009, distinctivefabric.com, family, lists, music, top 10, travel 2009, distinctivefabric.com, family, lee, lists, music, time, top 10, travel

A month has gone by since I last posted and nothing’s much changed…aside from the job front; I took a full-time job with the Home Depot.

There just hasn’t been much for me to write about recently…just struggling more now in some ways of dealing with fatherhood. Every single one of my endeavors or educational pursuits is on hold. It’s really shitty. I’m working an average of 60-hrs a week right now and then dealing with as much of DistinctiveFabric.com as I can. The rest of the time is spent either with the boy and Tristan or household chores, etc.

Coming to terms with my life at this point is frustrating, to say the least. I just don’t have the time to cultivate any new skills or refine any old ones.

So, for now, my blog and virtually everything else will lie dormant, indefinitely. Or at least until something interesting enough comes along to knock me out of this depressed lethargy.

2009, distinctivefabric.com, fatherhood 2009, distinctivefabric.com, fatherhood

These last few weeks have been some of the most intense I think I’ve yet experienced. Not like I haven’t been through some bad spells before or anything but this latest round has been really drilling and consistent.

From having had to freeze my DF salary, to filing for unemployment, to continuing to adjust to parenthood, to having to cut my health insurance out, then Tristan’s, to filing for medicaid for her and Lee (which still isn’t sorted out, so he’s still without coverage), to wrangling with two startups, to enrolling back into school (with ITT Tech for computer network systems) with full tuition covered but no way to start due to a complete lack of income.

In addition, I had some issues with communication between family and friends that added to everything else, really put me close a breaking point I’ve not recalled reaching before.

Thankfully, things started turning around a little this past weekend with the arrival of a reimbursement check from my canceled Blue Cross policy, confirmation on the start of my U.I. from California and most significantly, the long overdue activation of my solar web hosting service at SolarHoster.com. Granted, it’s still a far cry from what I envision it to be, but at least I can start hosting sites.

Meanwhile, Tristan and I have continued our discussions over what we’re doing concerning our living situation. She doesn’t want to stay here in PA and wants to move back to Ohio to have the support of her old friends and family there. Admittedly, it’s not a bad idea as it’s much cheaper there, she’ll be more grounded (in theory) with her friends, family and hometown, and we are exploring discussions of renting a house with her best girlfriend, Amanda.

We’ve submitted a rental app on one house so far and are waiting to hear back from the landlord. If that goes through, we’ll probably be moving around April 15th.

What this means for Rivertribe, my other startup exploration happening here in PA, is uncertain. Though it’s uncertain anyway as I’m having a hard time getting movement from my friend with the equipment that would allow startup of operations. This is actually kind of okay with me anyway, as I had only wanted to explore the possibility of starting Rivertribe up. Then I asked another friend to go in on it and things started getting out of control and I failed to manage things properly.

So as I should have learned from before, don’t do business with friends. Period. But if you insist on doing so, be very explicit about every little detail from the get go. Otherwise, things can get twisted fast. Which they have done to some degree in this instance, which is unfortunate, but not surprising considering where my life’s been these last few weeks.

Concerning startups and partners in general, I’d venture to say in some ways business mirrors people’s ways and gives greater clarity into the type of person you are. So maybe business together with friends is not such a bad thing, cause it helps cut away to the truth of things that you might not have otherwise seen before.

Anyway, my real priorities are certainly obvious now regardless having lost my salary. All else gets put on hold when you’ve got to find immediate income. It’s tough times to be job hunting though, especially when you don’t even own your own car and are sharing your partners. And more so in my case since I moved us to a rural setting without any public transit. Doh.

Thankfully, one of my LA contacts recently offered up a freelance gig with his company Ijhana. Hopefully things pan out, they’ve offered a few times before but nothing ever came of it. Hopefully now is the time. I/we can’t afford it to be otherwise.
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Update: We’ve found a house and put a deposit down (thanks Amanda!) and we’ll be moving sometime after April 1st.

2009, business, communication, daily log, design, distinctivefabric.com, employment, family, fatherhood, friends, hosting, lee, moving, relationships, rivertribe, school, solar hoster, startups, survival, tristan 2009, business, communication, daily log, employment, family, fatherhood, friends, lee, moving, relationships, rivertribe, school, solar, solar hosting, solarhoster.com, startups, survivial, tristan, work

So today I get one of my fabric partners regular shipments of my mail from the last few months from my west coast office.

These deliveries are always so horrific to open, since still nearly half if not more of my life routes through the LA office: all of my DF responsibilities (taxes, corporate filings, chargeback notices, merchant notices, etc.), Green Gurus (nearly the same minus merch stuff since we’re not active), much of my personal stuff (subscriptions if I have any, health ins crap, etc.), and a host of other misc items.

Today was no exception of course. Not. These last few weeks have been killing me and everything I’d come to create in my nearly 7 years in LA, has been coming to a head, rather their end, including: Green Gurus, sustainably powered hosting and data storage plans, etc. I’ve been doing the best to minimize this but now into my 6 month here in PA, things just are really fraying from either end, faster and faster.

The only good note I can think of these days is my son Lee. I’m doing my best to not dump my negative energy into him and more and more am coming to enjoy time spent with him. It’s tough though, what with my losing my salary last week, amongst everything else: Rivertribe plans were just winding up, SolarHoster/InfinityDrive were still hanging on, barely, Tristan’s wish to move us to Ohio, my enrollment into ITT Tech with full tuition coverage but no living expenses covered, and no vehicle of my own still.

Anyway, Lee’s gaining about a 1-lb a week right now and still looking very handsome and cute.

Incidentally, my Flickr uploads haven’t been coming through in about a week or so and Yahoo is taking forever in identifying the issue. I’ve uploaded half again or more, of what’s there already, but they’re just not showing up. So I’m thinking about switching over to Picasa maybe. I don’t relish the idea of having to recreate all my sets there, but at least it’s free and it works.

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While seemingly inevitable, it still sucks to face the facts and have to lay yourself off from your own company.

This is exactly what I’ve had to do this week to keep operations going at Distinctivefabric.com. So I’ve filed unemployment in California, though with their budget issues, my chances of getting unemployment income looks bleak.

Here’s what my resume looks like on the CalJOBS board:

My CalJOBS resume

And on the job hunt front, my options there seem equally dispairing as:

1. I don’t have my own vehicle and since I live in the rural country, public transit is not an option.
2. I have horrible credit and many low-end paying jobs (which are really probably my only option) do credit checks. I know because I’ve been refused a job countless times due to this issue.
3. The economy. Duh.

Oh what a great time to begin fatherhood. Moving here was one of my life’s biggest mistakes yet. A rebound from this would be a miracle.

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Sometime last week I started resurrecting the old outdoor adventure company, well at least its services anyway.

I started working at what had been called Schuylkill River Canoe & Tube, then Valley Forge Outdoors, then Hidden River Adventures, and what was to become Rivertribe, at the age of 16, in the summer of 1995. I progressed from in my 6+ years there from the new guy handling equipment at the beach/dock, to serving as one of its general managers. After the company closed its doors in the fall of 2001, I headed west to California, where I spent close to 7-years.

Now back in PA where it all began nearly 15-years later, I’ve found my long-lived hope of returning to the river business as a way of life reemerging stronger and clearer than ever before. I’d been hedging around my interest in doing this with the previous company owner and was getting a lukewarm response. So I decided to step things up a bit and started throwing a website together at my previously registered domain, Rivertribe.org.

I simultaneously emailed a bunch of former employees from the old river days and some new potential teammates while building out the site and renewing my discussions with the old boss. So far feedback has been good and the owner is more cooperative than before.

I’ve also partnered up with an old friend Cory, who has really taken to the Rivertribe concept and so we’ve been hammering away at all the details over the last week. It’s starting to get pretty intense, what with my other efforts at starting up the SolarHoster and maintaining my work with the fabric company, not to mention the still new tasks the baby has brought with his birthing.

Needless to say my time has been nearly completely devoured these last few weeks and I’ve been posting here less frequently than my previous goal, but that’s just how it goes sometimes.

Be sure to check Rivertribe.org and as always, can be found streaming bits away on Twitter.

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My office is too cold, had to move to the dining room to work last night and today.

Posted via email from JediWright’s Posterous

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