Comments:
My time since Grimsley has been like Godfather III, every time I think I'm out Greensboro pulls me back in.
I went off to school at Penn in the big(ger) city of Philadelphia. I'd always wanted to be a screenwriter so during my senior year some friends and I talked this guy named Judd Apatow into launching a Comic Relief show in Philadelphia (and somehow he let us know nothing college kids organize it). We pulled it off, raised a lot of money and though it paid nothing we consumed large quantities of beer with a few still struggling comics named Adam Sandler, Rob Schneider, and David Spade. Can you say missed opportunity?
Plan B was to go into the world of advertising as a copywriter. These were the lean post-Mad Men, pre-Internet years, and the best writing jobs in 1992 were in the political world. So I became a freelance writer for Geraldine Ferraro, Ann Richards, and several other folks running for office back then. They all lost. Not my fault I swear.
So I decided to invest in the ultimate delay tactic - grad school. After flipping a coin between culinary school and business school I decided on business school at University of Georgia.
Fate must have been on my side, because it was at UGA that I met Jenny. We married after graduation in 1996 and moved back to Texas, this time to Dallas where I finally landed a gig in the ad agency world. However I'd joined the dark side by becoming an Account Executive.
In 1998, I was leading our agency's largest account when we won a major new client in Raleigh. Needing someone in NC to run the business and with Jenny being 9 months pregnant, we moved back to Greensboro and Joey was born.
Greensboro turned out to be a great move. Joey had aunts, uncles, grandparents, and great-grandparents to spoil him and Jenny soon was producing the 5PM news at WFMY.
In 2000, I decided to take the plunge into the dot com world and held on long enough to gain some tremendous insight but no jackpot.
One year later, I decided to uproot the family once more. This time to Indianapolis, where I'd taken a position in Global e-Marketing with Eli Lilly. Leo was born shortly after arriving in Indy - two months premature, but he's been roaring like a lion since day one.
In 2004, I was offered the chance to build a specialized healthcare practice for my old agency which pulled us back to Greensboro one more time. This time we hope to stay put.
I've written several magazine articles and I've given countless speeches at industry conferences. My burning desire remains to be the writer I'd dreamed of being while goofing off during Ms Crisp's Journalism class in the Mac Lab - ahem, I mean when I was putting together another unforgettable issue of High Life.
Hope to catch up with everyone in October.
