Little did I know as I sank into the luxury chair in John’s plush office that I will actually come up with another intersection point. This was a few months back. I had shown up after office in John’s renowned company offices to discuss some unrelated business and get some pointers around talent. John, being extremely well known in Atlanta circles, was, as he always is, tremendously helpful that evening.

“Tell me about your new company”, he asked.

“Oh! We are a big data and analytics company specializing in geospatial data….” and I proceeded to give a two minute version of what our company is.

“Where are you based out of”?

And I rattled off the large offices we have in Kentucky, Georgia, Florida, Wisconsin, Oregon…

“Oregon?”, he interrupted, “My sister lives there”.

“Where?”, I enquired. Half expecting him to say Portland.

Instead he said “Oh! it is a very small place. You would not know”.

“Try me”

“It is a small town called Corvallis”.

“I have a office there. With 50 or so people!!!”

You can only imagine his surprise. I was not sure whether he was more surprised by the fact that I knew exactly where Corvallis is or that there are actually 50 people in Corvallis. In any case, that evening as I walked away, I asked him to send me his sister’s contacts. And promised to visit her next time I would be in that part of the country.

Which I did. Yesterday. Over a cup of coffee.

And boy, am I glad!! Otherwise I would have missed another fascinating person with an incredible personal story. I don’t think I have ever met somebody who knew Bill Gates and Steve Jobs that well personally. In fact, Jean – that being her name – sold the first Apple computer that the retail store ComputerLand had. (Anybody remembers ComputerLand from the seventies and eighties? I think they shut down in the nineties). I was fascinated by her contribution to Open Source movement and her personal association with Ritchie (of the Kernighan and Ritchie fame). Eventually, she sold her start up in the Bay Area and settled down in the quiet pastures of Oregon. She actually lives 45 minutes away from Corvallis in the Coastal Mountains in a 92-people town called Alpine. She followed her passion and love for nature. She is deep into wines – in fact, we found some common connections we had in a few owners of wineries around the area that we both knew. 

We spend a lot of time discussing what would be some great places to retire in. I strongly pushed for the case of Costa Rica, Chile, Portugal and Bulgaria. Unfortunately, I had my meetings starting in office soon and so I had to take leave after an hour. I have to come back and finish off our discussions…

The drive from Corvallis to Monmouth last evening was a short one, but a very beautiful one. As I went up 99W thru the quaint towns amidst beautiful wineries and fruit orchards of Oregon with the sun setting behind the Coastal Mountains as a backdrop, my mind floated back to an early morning of an August day in 2007. That was the day I had met Lia Knower in our running group for the first time. Ever since, she and I have run together many times. I got to run with her husband Matt once and a few weeks back, you may recollect the story I wrote after running with her daughter Lynette. 

After wrapping up a hard week on the road, on a Thursday evening, my normal route would have been to drive for a couple of hours to Portland and check into a hotel by the airport to catch the first flight home the next day. But not yesterday. Because I had a very important meeting set up. I was going to make a new friend. A 94 year old friend!

After the run with Lynette was done, over a cup of Starbucks coffee, I had explained to Lynette how her mother had found out about my trips to Oregon from Facebook and how, I got to know that her dad was from Oregon and that her mom spent quite some time there. I also told her that I found out her 94 year old grandmom was still in Oregon. In a place quite near to where I go. Excitedly, I let her know that I was actually going to show up at her grandmom’s house one day and make friends with her.

That day was yesterday. Last week, when I was trying to get my co-ordinates settled down, I found out that coincidentally, Lia was also going to be with her mom. In fact she was right there outside the house flagging me down as I pulled my car in to her mom’s street. And soon, together with her mom, her sister and herself, I headed out to another town which had a nice Italian restaurant.

The evening, in short, was a blast.

At 94 years old, Lia’s mom is unbelievably sharp and active. (I picked up a couple of figs from the garden she tends to). She was full of interesting stories too. And very graceful. At least she laughed heartily at all my jokes!! In any case, i got to learn about the history of how her dad (that would be Lynette’s great-grandfather) – who was in the First World War – eventually came to US from a small island sandwiched between mainland Greece and mainland Turkey! She was excited to know that I will be in Greece in a couple of weeks’ time to attempt my first marathon race. She even taught me how to say “Good Morning” in Greek!

What was even more fun was to watch the two sisters – Lia and Marcia – getting caught up in the history and excitedly starting “Did you know tht….” and then they would realize that they were learning a bit more of their own history from each other!!! Reminded me of how my own brother and sister often go thru those moments when I am in India to visit my parents.

I thought we had barely gotten started when we were told that the restaurant was closing. I had no idea where the two hours went. Reluctantly, we all headed back. After dropping them at their house, I started the long drive back to Portland.

That was one of my best evenings in a long long time!!!