I'm going to try to recap some here.
I just recently learned that when my boss was researching me prior to offering me the position, he came across this blog. He still hired me. Alls I can say he knew what he was getting!!
We've been on the Gold Coast for nearly a year now. May 30 was our 3 year anniversary here in Australia. Time certainly flies. I realized I never wrote about moving to the Gold Coast and how much things have changed since then. These are some major changes that I don't want to forget.
The project Mark was working on in Melbourne was cancelled early. That was the 2nd time and given it was meant to be a multi-year project, we were a bit gutted. He found a position here on the Gold Coast and as much as I REALLY didn't want to do another big move, we figured we didn't have a choice. A job is a job. There were a lot of positives about moving to Queensland, but I was just so sick of moving.
Mark was offered the job on a Friday; he started on the following Wednesday which was Kessler's birthday! We had a lot of packing to do and got started right away only to have to pack everything up again because Kessler's birthday party was at the house the following weekend. It was tough not having Mark there for so many reasons. Trying to do it all with 2 kids was beyond difficult and we just missed him. It ranks up there as one of the hardest times of my life. A lot happened those weeks which are still too traumatic to discuss. The beginning of the end of the move began when the kids, Merlin and I, picked up Mark from the airport with the car loaded to the gills. He'd just flown from the Gold Coast to Melbourne only to do the long drive back.
Mark drove 18 of the 20 hours that finally brought us to our new home and another chapter of our life. He somehow managed to find us a beautiful house to rent, about 2 kms from his new work location. With the type of work Mark does, it's very difficult to find a house nearby as he's typically working for large companies in large cities. Despite how much I didn't want to move again, things were starting to look up.
Unfortunately, about 6 weeks after we moved here, on Mark's birthday, he was given notice that the project was canceled. He had one week before he was out of work. To describe this as devastating would be an understatement. One of the risks of moving to the Gold Coast was this is not a huge city. There's very little chance of Mark finding another job here. It was a risk we were willing to take given that the project we moved here for was meant to last 3 years. We'd been through a fair amount the last few years... this really seemed unfathomable.
Mark immediately started the daunting task of finding more work. He had quite a few leads, but very little time. The first one that came through was a position in Tasmania, 2200km away. He was the new Project Manager for an SAP deployment with Hydro Tasmania. Given that we had just signed a new lease, just enrolled Makena in a new school along with the fact that only place worse than the Gold Coast for finding SAP work is Tasmania, we decided that rather than move the whole family again, Mark would commute each week. This was such a tough decision, but there was really no other choice.
I'll backtrack just a bit now. Shortly after moving to the Gold Coast, I flew back to Melbourne to help one of Mark's friends, Mustafa. He had started a business and was doing a trade show there. He needed someone to help him man the booth. On my return flight I sat next to a lovely woman on the plane. We got to talking about all kinds of things, but the notable point was that her daughter worked on the Gold Coast in IT. We exchanged details and she put me in touch with her daughter. We met for coffee and finally I got to meet her boss. I interviewed for the position along with 14 other people! Given that I had been out of the IT industry for a bit, I'm glad I only found out how many I was up against recently!
A few LONG weeks later I was offered the job. I started 6 November, which is funny given that was election day. I have been hinged to US politics for the last few years, so starting work the same day as the election was a bit tortuous for me!
So, I started working full time about a month after Mark start commuting to Tassie Monday-Friday. Life suddenly got very hard. I have soooo much respect for all of the single working parents out there, especially those without family around to help! It is tough! It is so nice to be working out in an office working again. I love my boss and enjoy the challenges, well, some of them. It's nice to be a part of something like this again!
We are now coming up on 9 months since Mark started his commute! It feels like years have passed. We miss him so much.. particularly the last few weeks. You see, the first phase of the project is going live this weekend. So, he's had to stay in Tassie 2 out of the last 3 weekends! I miss him (I might have mentioned that), but I am so proud of him for what he's nearly accomplished! Go MARK!! :)
