Week 25 - The Oregon Trail

Week 25 Picture

 We've only been out of Oklahoma 10 days, but it feels like we've been gone forever. Overall, my trip to Oregon was great. I got to spend some time getting to know Corvallis, the campus, and getting an idea of what my future as an assistant professor at Oregon State will be like. The good news is that all signs are positive. It was fun getting to put faces to the names of people that I have been communicating with over the last year. I have some great colleagues that I'll be working with at OSU and the support staff in the College of Business is a collection of wonderful, relentlessly helpful people. I also had a bit of free time while I was out in Corvallis to explore the area. I even made the 40 minute, scenic drive to the coast - something I expect I will be doing a lot of in the coming years. I'm really looking forward to this. Getting this job has truly been a blessing. I can already tell that Oregon will be a great fit for me and my family.

One of my primary goals while I was out in Oregon was to find a place for us to live. It ended up being a lot tougher than I anticipated. The rental market in Corvallis was pretty much nonexistent, which meant we had a tough choice. We could either (a) settle for a rental that does not meet our standards and throw away a fortune each month in rent or (b) buy a house based solely on my two day tour of the local retail market and the picture/video tours I shared with Kimbre. Neither option was optimal, but we ended up deciding that our money would be better spent buying a house than padding the pockets of a land lord with no real incentive to keep us around. As a result, in less than 7 days we went from making the decision to buy to having an offer on a house accepted and under contract. In sum, it's been a pretty overwhelming turn of events. A side effect of all this madness is that we'll be staying in Colorado a bit longer than we expected as we wait for closing. It will be nice to get to spend extra time with our family and friends. Still, it's kind of stressful being stuck in purgatory somewhere between your past and your future.

As great (and productive) as my trip was, it was really tough being away from my son. It's the first time since Jay was born that I went more than 24 hours without getting to hold him. It was even harder than I expected. I spent about an hour each night before I went to bed just looking at pictures of him and smiling. He's a lot of work, but I just love him so much that I'd do all the work in the world just to get to see that trademark smile of his. Unfortunately, he's not handling the transition all that well. Even though he's having a great time getting to spend some time with his extended family, at night he's been sleeping worse than ever getting up every two hours --- sometimes even more often than that. It's been exhausting, but fortunately Kimbre and I have had enough spare time in the mornings to sneak in a quick nap to make up for the lost sleep at night.

In the end, he's worth it. No doubt in my mind. If anything the frustrations just make the good times we get with him during the day are made all that much better by contrast of the agony of staying up with him all night.