SchizoFrenetic

Written Tuesday night, April 14th @ LAX.

Last week I got a job offer after 19 months of coming THIS close. A job offer that I quickly accepted, even though it means moving clear across the country to yet another city where I’d have to “start over,” because it’s a way into a hot industry that will only pick up speed with time and the Obama administration’s support.

Of course I wanted to share the news with my network immediately, so I tweeted it while getting the offer, and promptly followed up with a FaceBook status update. Then I called my grandma, my two best friends – Hi! Jane and Ryan – my mom, my aunt: how old school of me. I noted the turn of events through my LinkedIn status.

By 11pm that night I sent out an email announcing the offer to the 90+ person network that had been most closely tied to my job search, asking for their help yet again.

Given that I’d be moving to a new city, I wanted introductions to their friends in the area and neighborhood tips if they’d lived there. Happy friends and connections emailed their congratulations, and within hours information started pouring in. E-mail introductions were made and cell phone numbers were swapped. The list of neighborhoods I should be looking in for an abode dropped dramatically.

I requested that people save their copier paper boxes at the office, so I could ship my 350+ book collection back to the East in manageable 35 lbs blocks. More than a dozen boxes have been dropped off and picked up in the days that followed.

Knowing that I’d be apartment hunting in DC this week, I asked friends to try to hook me up with metro-accessible sofa(s). I quickly got an offer from a friend of friend who could help out one night. I’ve never met Michelle, but I’m told she’s similarly gifted at keeping in touch with people, which is why the introduction was made.

But I still needed a sofa for two more nights, and Metro-accessible people in my secondary circle were out of town. And then I saw the email from an acquaintance I met when I joined her ning community of women interested in women and girl advocacy. She reminded me of the DC group.

So I decided what’s the harm in asking, right? I’ve been communicating with one of the women off and on for a year, so it’s not like she was a complete stranger. I noted that I realized it was really presumptuous to even ask, so she needn’t feel obliged. Turns out she and her husband were happy to host me Thursday and Friday night, which meant I didn’t have to pay out for pricey 2-star hotels for two nights – hostels in DC were all booked up.

So I had boxes, sofas, neighborhoods and possible new friends covered. What to do about the apartment hunting? I googled income tax brackets and found people in DC, despite their lack of national legislative representation, had rates 3%+ higher than MD or VA, so DC proper living was quickly nixed. Craigslist found me a great place in Santa Monica, so I could only hope it will do the same for me in Virginia.

Over the past few days I’ve emailed and called posters about their listings along the Orange line in VA and the Red line in Maryland. Thanks to Google maps, I’ve been able to print out pictoral directions to about 6 places that I have firm plans to check out over the next few days. I whittled down possibilities based on their distance from the metro using the map tools. It’s entirely possible the first place I look at tomorrow could be the one if it lives up to the print ad and my lengthy Q and A with the property manager.

I’ve downloaded metro schedules and maps of gyms near my new office so I can pick up applications to teach pilates on the side.

Now as I wait for my LAX to MKE leg of my trip to board, I wonder how much harder it was to move to a new city 15 years ago before the Internet put information a mere right click away. . .

New job announcements would be relegated to Christmas newsletters or word-of-mouth because you probably wouldn’t phone or send a letter to your entire network one by one. People would learn on an as needed basis that you had switched jobs and moved, which meant you wouldn’t be able to immediately take advantage of their network to build yours in a new place.

Moving must have been an ordeal, as you’d have had to rely on print ads that are typically out of date almost as fast as they’re printed. And you’d either be rather reliant on bulky fold out maps to orient yourself at intervals in a city you were unfamiliar with. With Google maps I can literally look at street level photos of the addresses I’m looking up.

Back in the day, I wouldn’t have had instant access to connections in my new home city or an easy way to tap into the knowledge of more distant connections about that city.

So as I layover in the Milwaukee airport for 2 hours, I can’t help but appreciate that 2009 technology is making what could have been a painful move a more streamlined experience with fewer question marks.

How have you tapped your network to smooth life transitions?