Holiday Happenings

Time for us to spill sprinkles everywhere, smear frosting all over the kitchen and eat the candy we're supposed to be putting on the houses until mom has a nervous breakdown!

Left to right, Natalie, Me, Micah/Emily, Angela

Popcorn and a movie

'

"Merry Chrithmath"

Fun Ward Christmas Party

Sounds like it got pretty crazy once they broke out the karaoke, but idno, I had already taken a Very Grouchy Baby home...

Micah recently has his last week at L3Harris and we managed to sneak in to the company's annual Christmas "Zoo Day" one final time.

recording in their field journals on the train ride

We snuck out of the childrens' area and left Micah here sleeping. He caught up quickly, though, having woken himself up snoring.

hard to get a picture of this little munchkin that isn't blurry

building a fort

This is a Patagonian Cavy. Emily was terrified of the goats and llamas and didn't care to pet anything, just climb on the goats' little jungle gym.

Bull riding

Natalie took this picture of the tree- most of the ornaments on the bottom 2 feet have migrated to the upper part as Emily removed them and we put them back on higher up.

practice makes perfect

New job

I recently decided to take a new job opportunity. I am leaving L3Harris to join a start up called Critical Frequency Design founded in January by a former program manager at Harris. A trusted colleague of mine at L3Harris was contacted earlier this year by the former program manager and founder of CFD. Since starting the company, which has thus far offered contract engineering services to various aerospace companies, they have done very well. One of the main goals will be providing ruggedized high bandwidth communications between sensors and processors on the joint strike fighter F35. Many solutions utilize recent advances in photonics technology, which is my and my colleague's primary area of expertise and why he was solicited. In telling me of this opportunity in confidence, we thought of the opportunity to leverage how well we work together and he put in a good word for me, so we were both offered jobs and equity in the company.

Why did I do this? A lot of reasons, actually. For about a year, and especially since the merger with L3, the corporate culture, especially around the process for internal research and development spending (where I have spent a lot of time, having had issues obtaining a security clearance), has deteriorated with more of my time spent justifying what I have done or am proposing to do rather than actually doing it. Also, in a very large company, there appears to be very little incentive for actually doing or making anything worthwhile and far more financial incentive to simply be assigned to programs associated with high dollar values. These large programs exist to be inefficient and employ a large engineering workforce so that L3Harris can charge large sums of money to their customers. For this and other reasons, I had been looking for ways to move to Raleigh with a smaller company. Really, only I have wanted to move to Raleigh. I have wanted to be closer to family members of whom we can derive and provide support (i.e. the Agle's in Raleigh, my sister's family in Charlotte, and the Stoddard's in Wilmington). Sarah, understandably, finds 10 hours car rides (both ways) highly stressful especially with our kids, so I thought the only way to be closer is to move closer.

I have tried to find a good fit for me professionally there. It has been fairly difficult but I have found some good leads and potential opportunities for the future. The majority of work in my field is centered in the DC area, California, or Boston. If I change fields, switching to computer vision and machine learning e.g., I have much more options and some good ones in the RTP area, however, these jobs are fairly competitive (not saying I couldn't get them if a made a concerted effort, however) and many of them are also with large defense contractors (BAE, Teledyne, ARA) with whom I would probably have similar cultural issues to L3Harris. At my new job, I will be an entrepreneur, developing new products and services directly to customers and will be highly valued for my natural strengths of creativity and innovation. My salary and benefits have both improved, and I know I could get a job if it doesn't work out (many at L3Harris have said they would have us back in a heart beat, there's just so much work in defense right now). I also have equity and financial stake in the success of the business, which is an exciting opportunity but may ultimately prove to be worthless. Also, my new employer and Charles (trusted colleague and CTO of the new company) have said that they would be okay with me working remotely from my preferred location, although CFD is based out of a VC incubator 5 minutes down the road from L3Harris.

As for whether or not we will move to Raleigh, definitely not for at least another year I'd say. I wouldn't be nearly as effective working remotely, especially during this critical time of when we'd be defining the future of our business. Also, I realized one night as I was taking Natalie out for ice cream that moving would likely be hardest on everyone but me. Natalie got quite emotional thinking of leaving her friends at school and church when I started asking how she would feel if we moved to Raleigh. Also, we are still in the middle of obtaining funds from an insurance claim and then making repairs on the home, with the soonest possibility of being done probably Feb.-March. I do want to see and visit family more, maybe we could invest more in airfare and car rentals with my increased income (but probably not as I pretty sure Sarah would say). There is also the opportunity to open up and manage a remote/satellite office of the new business myself in Raleigh, especially if we grow significantly in the next year as we're projecting. Probably more likely is the possibility to leverage the increased freedom I now have to develop technically in adjacent fields (like RF design and machine learning/computer vision) at my new job so that I am ready for job interviews when the next opportunity becomes more eminent. There is one company (defense company, 50-100 employees) in particular that I think would be a great fit based in Cary, but I would likely need to gain some RF design experience. Also, as per my comments above, I would really only be willing to make the move if I weren't dragging my family with me but we all felt motivated to go together.

Lastly, I'll say that things have been pretty great lately, Natalie and Sarah went out to Frozen II tonight and they won't stop singing "Ah-ah_Ah-uah" at various pitch levels. Angela and a church friend are going to see it this Saturday so I'll be the only one left out. We've had a cold front come with lows in the 50's at night which has been awesome. The girls are really making strides academically and socially and Emily is still super duper cute but super whiny at night. I'm also just trying to enjoy this time of my life more as I realize this is prime time to be making more memories together. Lately, I have returned to Crossfit and my herniated disc injury has improved with me gaining core and supporting muscle strength and learning what triggers pain and how to modify to avoid it. My overall energy level is sooo much better with intense exercise. I remember always feeling fatigued and just like crap for the past few months that I had stopped going. Unfortunately, they are closing down my current Crossfit box so I'll have to find a good alternative before the end of the month. Anyways, I have unloaded, good night.

- Micah

Halloween

This post brought to you by Micah's cruel, emotionally unavailable wife

I'm glad they picked costumes this year that were easy

And that they're at a point where they like to macth

Growing up in PA: Halloween costumes must be able to be worn with a winter coat

Growing up in FL: Halloween costumes  must be able to withstand rain

Good thing we have a house full of toys so my kid can play with the groceries 

Getting ready for the primary program

Decade Day for Red Ribbon week

We got to visit with LeAnn for a couple of days as she came south to catch the tail end of Gabby and Blakes' recent Disney vacation. I was glad to see them!

Soccer season has ended. Natalie decided that she isn't interested in doing is again next season. Angela decided that sitting on the sidelines isn't for her and she wants to play in the spring. 

I was, obviously, a very serious coach and a great influence on my team

 

Hello world

Often when someone learns a new programming language, the first thing they do after downloading an IDE is make a simple program that prints "Hello world" to the console and then runs it to verify the compiler and environment is working properly.

I lead into this blog post this way because lately I feel like all I do is think about technical things at work, when what I really want to do is to somehow say "Hello world" to the world and have the world respond back with "Hello Micah, we know you're there, we are aware of your experience and that you try to do your best, you are a valid person". I know that the center of my faith and hope needs to be in Christ, but sometimes I just wish that the empathy I know Christ has for me could manifest in the form of humans more than it currently does.

I'm not saying that it doesn't, just that those experience are few and far between, and that I can't seem to rid myself of my need for them, in spite of how much I would like that to be the case. For me, feeling devoid of human connection is definitely one of my biggest trials in life. Everyone has major trials in this life, and everyone's trials and experience is different. Recognizing this makes me want to reach out to others and offer a listening ear, but I have to be careful not to project my own experience onto theirs.

Why does reaching out and finding human connection seem so daunting to me? Why do I feel paralyzed and unable to act? For longer than I can remember I have felt this way, and although I always come to the point of feeling like I can bear no more, either it brings me to me knees and finally humbles me (until the next time) or life happens and I get caught up in all of my many responsibilities (more often the case lately).

A significant portion of this has to do with my relationship, or lack thereof, with my spouse Sarah, but there is also a large part that is just my own paradigm. What no one can prepare you for before marriage is the possibility for incredible loneliness that can exist between two otherwise well-meaning individuals who love each other but have widely disparate views about what that means.

I know I'm not alone in feeling this way, but from what I can tell (or at least what data Google can educate me with), this dynamic is far more common with reversed gender assignments, i.e. well-meaning (but emotionally detached male) needs to maintain excessive emotional distance from a spouse seeking connection in the marriage. On the outside, everything seems perfectly fine, on the inside, hearts slowly break until each spouse has nothing left to give.

Although this is a rather extreme case, I would conjecture that a spectrum of this dynamic is experienced my a large portion of society (certainly Americans) and the LDS church. My question is then this, why in the course of me being married have discussions centered on how to apply the Gospel to these situations only been taught in a group setting once (this was also a voluntary class led by LDSFS and not part of church curriculum)?

I don't know the answers, only questions. In fact, that's the only reason I seem to be valuable at work, because I gravitate towards fundamental questions, it often leads to innovative solutions because it challenges the status quo. I'm not saying that I want to change the status quo of the church, I am just asking if this example and related marital challenges are a source of pain and frustration for many people, shouldn't we try to expound more on how to apply the Gospel to improve in these areas?

Wow, in writing this post I went from my sad state to my mad/motivated state. It's incredible to think that mad can be a more productive emotion than sad. I think the key is to utilize the motivation that it stimulates and then to allow the Atonement to dissipate the negative aspects. In a weird way I feel better just writing this, which leads me to another realization, maybe my need for human connection is in part just a need for understanding which comes by way of talking things through. So by talking things through via writing or "insert other expressive medium here", I can also arrive at understanding which partly satisfies the initial need.

Lastly, I want to leave work by 5:30 everyday to be home by 5:40. This morning I made that commitment, but somehow, as is usually the case, a lot of necessary work begs to be done between 5:30-5:45, and I didn't leave the office until 6:00. I set a reminder on my phone, but it didn't work, I know, technology always fails when you need it most. Anyways, maybe by writing my commitment down here I will hold myself to it.

- Micah

One-Year-Old Emily

Neanderthals, New Roof, and Back to School

So I went to Arlington, VA for a business trip recently and had a little time to kill before my flight departed the next day, so I took an Uber over to the National Mall area and saw many of the monuments. It was actually my first time visiting that area. Of the few things I saw, I was most struck by the words of Abraham Lincoln inscribed next to his monument. I was impressed that his words could resonate with me considering the time and cultural gap between our times in this country. Needless to say, for me this was all in stark contrast to the lack of that kind of leadership today, which was both depressing and motivating at the same time. It makes me want to participate more in our world, in conversations about difficult problems and how to solve them, in our societal choices, etc.

I was also struck by the exhibit at the Natural History museum on the evolutionary origins of modern humans. On a more lighthearted note this is apparently what AI says I would look like at a Neanderthal. Anyways, learning about our distant evolutionary ancestors just had me thinking about the plan of salvation and how God may have allowed certain events to come to pass to produce a species capable of housing the His spiritual offspring. At least for me, it seemed enlightening at the time.

In other news, Emily continues to be cute and has started walking around, which is pretty terrifying honestly.

We also now have a new roof, and it looks great. Now we are just waiting to have funds dispersed from our lender, we just sent them the endorsed checks from insurance. We want to take care of the interior water damage and window replacement with the remaining part of those funds, but we have to wait until the case that the attorney started is settled, which hopefully will be in the next month or so.

Today was Natalie's second day of 2nd grade and Angela's first day of Kindergarten. They are both pretty excited and positive about school so far, it's been a whole 1.5 days. 

Even though I think they'll both have fun and learn at school, this is what they really want to be doing. FYI, N64 Super Smash bros. spans multiple generations. FYI, I can easily beat Sarah and both girls on one team against me.

Lastly, a bit on my career development. I love my job, and would be totally happy continuing my career in optical engineering for the defense industry if there were options to move anywhere I'd like. After recently considering some options, I really think it would be best for us to be located in NC closer to family of whom can be a support to us and to whom we can support. There have been some other work opportunities that could have materialized but didn't because they weren't exactly the right fit. It has to be the right fit because I really don't want to be in the business of moving my family around on every whim, it's stressful for everyone involved, especially as the kids are now getting older and making friends in school. 

The main issue I have with the optics and photonics industry is that there really are only a few places in this country that support the work for which I'm both qualified and interested, i.e. it's a pretty small field. Looking around me though I see that Machine Learning (ML) and Computer Vision (CV) are skills that are in much higher demand with open job reqs in Raleigh/Durham and pretty much any major city as these disciplines are being applied in almost every field imaginable. It's scary to consider a complete change of field, after all, I am now a senior optical engineer and subject matter expert in a large defense company and if I applied cold for one of these positions I would not likely be at the same level of seniority or pay grade. 

L3Harris has activity applying ML and CV currently, so a better strategy for me will be to inject myself into those projects to gain experience quickly and then market myself as an expert who understands both sides of the camera, the hardware optics and electronics as well as the software in delivering information products through ML and CV. With this skill set I think it might be great to work for Teledyne Scientific Imaging out of Durham which is an international company serving both commercial and defense industries. Another option would be Leica Microsystems or another company doing biomedical optics and imaging research (again they only have reqs for people with ML/CV backgrounds). 

Later in life, after the girls move out, I would likely want to see if I could move into academia and secure a professorship. I would do this now, in fact, academia would be a way for us to have greater geographic flexibility. However, Sarah's biggest complaint is that when I am doing research full time (as opposed to industry where I can balance some research with development work) it is too tempting for me to be swept away in solving all the world's optics problems and our life balance, or lack thereof, suffers. Maybe when the girls are gone I can find a way to balance that passion with my passion for my relationship with Sarah, but for now it's just not really possible, so I need to stick with opportunities in large companies as we now know that that seems to work okay for us.

That's enough for tonight.

Endless Summer

Many license plates in Florida say "endless summer" on them. This is accurate for where we live. It is very hot outside for at least half of the year. When I first moved here, I thought this wouldn't bother me since I grew up outside of Atlanta. Lately, however, it's been getting to me. It feels like the sun is beating down on me, draining me of any excess energy.

This is Micah, by the way. This blog has been less frequently updated for a while now. I'm not making any promises to regularly update it from now on, but I feel like writing tonight, so here I am, and we'll see if I make a habit of updating in the future. 

Emily: Emily is very, very, cute. She is too cute. She is approaching an age of optimal cuteness, perhaps. Observe.

How our kids have had such cuteness is somewhat of a mystery to me. It certainly has nothing to do with me. It's as if there is some magical combination of Sarah and my genes that produces cuteness which exceeds our own. This is fortuitous since the girls can be a little oppressive and annoying from time to time. But anyways back to Emily. She can say: "dada", "mama", "baba", and "a-lala" (translation Angela). She can stand without support and cruises everywhere, but has not walked yet. She's very close though, she probably could but she chooses not to since she gets around fine with her gimpy crawl in which she favors one side heavily. She is both very happy and very sensitive, like Natalie and Angela have been. I think she will be very bright, though it's hard to say at this point whether she will be more like Natalie or Angela. 

Angela: Angela passed VPK with flying colors, and is now feeling pretty bored this summer. She loves playing games, playing more games, did I mention playing games? She can't wait for kindergarten to start and neither can we ; ). She will be going to the same charter school as Natalie, West Melbourne School for Science, and has a chance of having the same kindergarten teacher as Natalie had (she had the same VPK teacher that Natalie had, btw). It feels like there should be a picture of Angela here, here's one

Natalie: To me, it feels like Natalie has leveled up recently. She read's chapter books, such as diary of wimpy kid and the like, on her own and finds this relaxing. She was tested this year for the gifted program, and scored just below the score at which they recommend placement at her school, but they said to request testing next year, which we probably will. Natalie still enjoys playing and being silly with Angela, but recently it feels like she's taken on more and more pseudo-adultish characteristics, which is both refreshing and terrifying. It's fun for me to watch her grow and try to help where I can, because I feel like I understand her better than she knows, because we have some things in common. It's also hard for me to observe some of the negative behaviors associated with Natalie's personality, since many are just magnified expressions of my own negative tendencies. Here is a cameo.

Both girls are a little obsessed with TV shows, which is we try to limit to 2 hours of screen time daily. Natalie, especially, has been a little too obsessed, and can become very emotional at the suggestion that we do something else as a family that can take the place of TV time, e.g. As a parent, it's hard to compete for your child's attention, with Youtube and Netflix offering essentially endless entertainment which is way more captivating than anything associated with reality. Although this is a harsh reality, we have to stand firm in requiring that we do lots of things in the real world as a family, like going on bike rides, playing outside, and playing games together, etc.

As for me and Sarah, we are trying to move forward, but we have our ups and downs. All in all, though, it's hard not to accept the many blessings we have in our life. To not be grateful for the conveniences and relative ease of life which we regularly experience would mock the sacrifices and physical/emotional hardships of most of humanity since well, as long as we know about. We have a home and I have a steady job which pays our bills and enables us to live without worrying too much about finances. We have vehicles which work and can carry our family to where we need to be and we have friends nearby who we can relate with. We have a lot to be thankful for. 

I think for tonight I'll just leave it at that, but I hope in the future I can relate more on a personal level about things that fill my thoughts from day to day. E.g., I find it amazing that so many of us can feel so deeply about this thing or that or long for human connections which seem to elude us, no matter how hard we try. Though we live in a world of temporal well being and comfort, many of us are not entirely well or whole. I know that I need to turn to the Savior, and I know that He knows everything we go through, and I'm grateful for this and need to rely on the Atonement more than I do now. I just don't want to let my life go by and not find a way to connect with others or share with the world what I feel and see while I am here. 

Cheers,

Micah