Month: September 2023

Operating a small business can be a roller coaster ride, ups and downs, twists and turns, and often in rapid succession. This has been one of those weeks.

In the middle of last week, we sat helpless as a buyer walked away from a transaction we’d been assisting with for months. This is a client we really enjoy working with and he’s built an incredible business. Everything was in line for an end of month close, then the buyer backed out. It was a gut punch for everyone involved. We will continue to support this client as he and the broker implement a strategy in the coming months to find another buyer and we’ll jump in to help again when the time comes. Then by Friday we were brought in to start an even larger transaction and now have several warm leads through our referral network.

The last couple of days have been filled with reviewing purchase agreements and letters of intent and having client calls to go over these transaction documents. These are the grinding days and the grinding calls, the sorts of calls we liken to a trip to the dentist. For me, these are the sorts of days when the emotion of Miles Davis playing his trumpet is the perfect background soundtrack. They are good days, but there have been fewer of them than I would’ve preferred over the past few months.

Today we had a closing. Sure it stretched out longer than it should have, but that happens with certain forms of financing. This was another closing that gave us more relief than euphoria but no matter, it’s accomplished. There is another small transaction where the documents are signed and it will close on Monday. Again, just momentary relief and onto the next one.

It’s been an eventful week. Most of them feel eventful now. During a conversation yesterday with a classmate from law school who stayed in the big firm litigation world, I was smacked in the face with the reality of how crazy that really is.

This was a much quieter week than I’ve had in a while. I didn’t drive hundreds of miles or fly across the country or move into a new apartment. It was a chance to finally feel settled in my new surroundings, try a few new restaurants (a very good pizza place and a not-so-good bbq place), and put things in their place in my living space. Well, mostly, as there is still one project that needs to be finished.

Over the next week, I’ll continue the push to settle into my new home. I’m going to join a coworking space downtown but with different purposes than when I’ve tried coworking spaces before. This time I’m not getting an office and will probably spend no more than a couple of hours at a time there. I already have an office that works just fine for deep, uninterrupted work. My aims are twofold, to have somewhere to anchor as a workplace that requires me to leave my apartment building—it’s a ten minute walk, just long enough to allow a mental frame shift—and to gain access to the member events. It is for that latter reason that I chose the most established and biggest coworking space here instead of one that might have more amenities. I don’t consume caffeine anyway. Will the coworking space experiment work this time? I don’t know, but the odds are higher than for my prior attempts. I also continue the search for new activities to try, even if some of those won’t start for a while yet.

After a few days in the South Bay for the SaaStr conference and related events, I spent a couple of days north of the Golden Gate Bridge (which was shrouded in fog both times I crossed it). That meant that I spent zero time in San Francisco itself this trip; I didn’t want to see it in its current state. Even stores I visited during my trip last year have now closed and I prefer happier memories.

It was a pleasant and relaxed couple of days in a place that feels like it’s a world away from the city just across the bay. I even rode along for a work-related journey some distance inland and got to experience the insanity of Northern California’s microclimates. In the space of about 30 miles, the temperature increased almost 20 degrees even as the altitude increased by no more than a few hundred feet. In this country that only really happens near the Pacific coast.

These couple of days were about closure. It was a natural coda to the cross-country road trip that saw me snake across America through the spring and early summer. There was also confirmation that I made the right choice for me. It is a nice place to visit and I’m sure I’ll visit again, but California could never be my home. The mindset and zeitgeist are too different from what I’ve known and am comfortable in even though I now live and breathe technology companies. Instead, I’ve committed to North Carolina and building a home here. Curling season starts up in just a few weeks and I’m looking to add a few more activities to my plate before then.

I will admit that it is a little odd that I’m flying to the west coast so soon after having driven to the west coast, but that’s life. This week is going to be another iteration of the continued experimentation that is our law firm. We’ve done small conferences before, will do another one in October, but this is the first megaconference we will have attended as a partnership. It’s also going to be a much quicker turnaround than when we went to Europe for a conference last year and each stayed for several weeks. I am going to spend a few extra days in the Bay Area but I’ll be alone in doing so.

My goal was to finish setting up my apartment before leaving on this trip. That didn’t happen as I’m still waiting on a few more deliveries. It’s close though. This scramble also meant that I didn’t finish packing until this morning. No one who has travelled with me will be surprised by that news.