Ten Years ago Today (December 1998)
A friend’s blog led me to another blog, where I found that somebody had done a “Twenty Years Ago Today:” entry. I think it’s neat. I’m going to try a Ten Year version, then a Twenty. We’ll see how far back I feel like going.
Ten years ago today, I was living in San Jose, working at 3Com Corporation. I was the technical lead for the web site group. The web was two years old. 3Com’s web site ran on one Sun server. It was all static HTML, except for some dynamic page generation that ran on a perl script that I had written. I didn’t know that the whole method of web delivery would change in the next year and that I’d find myself looking for other work. (Fortunately, I found it.)
Ten years ago today, I was just beginning my term as Master of my Masonic Lodge. I had become a Mason six years before, and had worked my way through the officer positions. Now I was leading the Lodge. This is a bit more dramatic than being president of most societies and boards. In the tradition of the old trade guilds, the Master has lots of power — on paper. In fact, although the Master can say, “it is my will and pleasure that…”, he’d better be careful of what “that” is, or his will and pleasure will not be very forthcoming. Nonetheless, I had a full year of lodge programs and problems to deal with, and I was much excited about it.
Ten years ago today, we were just looking at buying our first RV. This decision would lead to major lifestyle changes for us, though we had no clue that we were doing anything other than changing our vacation plans.
Ten years ago, last summer, I took a week’s motorcycle trip on the Oregon coast. I rode from San Jose, up 101 through Northern California, and all the way up 101 to Astoria. I came home on I-5. I had many interesting days, though no “adventures.” It would be the last motorcycle trip before I sold the Gold Wing.
Funny how so few paragraphs can encapsulate so many beginnings, and so many endings. Clearly I’ve given my readers a very tiny overview, but the events mentioned above meant a lot to me, and even as they were shaped by what had gone before, they shaped what came afterward.