Home is Wherever I'm with You: Summer 2014

A couple of Sundays ago Colin and I walked through the low brush on Mount Diablo. The sky was an expressionist's dream of layered oranges and bright pinks. The sunset cast a romantic rosy glow on the yellow hills. As the sun sank below the horizon we wistfully wished we could stop time. Colin's hand tightened around mine, confident, excited and nervous for all of the changes the next day would bring.

It was the last sunset of our summer. On Monday morning Colin started a new job, and my job hunt went into full swing. The last two months have been a joy, and while we could have gotten use to early retirement, we also felt ready to start keeping track of days again.

Colin finished his Masters of Engineering at MIT at the very end of May, and I had my last day at Micronotes Inc. Colin had a job lined up with Ginger.io in downtown San Francisco starting in August, giving us two months to play. We traveled around the US seeing sites, friends and family, and also managed to catch a couple World Cup games and some beach time in Brazil. .

The next couple of entries will track our summer adventures starting with our trip to Cape Cod and leaving Boston.

Our last few weeks in Boston were crazy busy. Colin was in lab finishing his thesis 12-14 hours/day 6 days a week. His lab friends teased me about spending more time with him than I did, and I was jealous. I was packing us up, selling anything that wouldn't fit into a packing box, and wrapping up at work. Moving cross-country and transitioning out of a 7-person start-up after 4 years is no joke.

We got to spend our last weekend in Boston on the Cape with Colin's wonderful parents. It was a delightful trip. In the mornings Colin and I spent final minutes proofreading his academic labor of love, and in the afternoons we hiked on the seashores and ate delicious crab cakes.

Cape Cod is quintessential New England. Little houses with outdoor showers, crab and lobster joints everywhere, salmon shorts, and white picket fences along the picture perfect shores. We tried to convince Colin's parents to buy a home there, but all the locals' winter memories were still too fresh to make a compelling case.

So many things happened to us in Boston and Cambridge. Too many firsts to list. Independently we became adults in this city with all of the wonders, surprises and occasional disappointments. We have life long friendships that were started here, we had our first date at the Cheesecake Factory in the Prudential Center, and we made it through every winter without losing any fingers or toes to frostbite (a much bigger accomplishment for me than Colin).

We are going to miss the glorious spring days, and the mesmerizing colors of falls. We are going to miss the camera that detects your mood in the MIT halls, and times spent sitting on the Weeks footbridge. We are leaving a piece of our hearts in Boston, but Boston has given us so much more in return. Thank you, Boston, for being our first home together.

Now a couple of throwback pictures from the city we love