The foundry in Spokane, Washington that we want Marshall to work for after graduation (May 2014) offered him a summer internship for 2013. In fact, they REALLY want him to do the internship.
We met Ed, the General Manager of Spokane Industries, on April 30th, at a Foundry Education Foundation (FEF) banquet in San Marcos; he sat to Marshall's left at our table. After completing this summer's internship at Denison, Marshall wanted to contact Ed about employment in the future. He left some messages, and apparently Ed got them. He passed Marshall's name along to the Technical Director Rod along with our story of Marshall being in school and us genuinely wanting to move to the northern Idaho area upon graduation. He really liked that Marshall was "stable" and had a family.
Well, on Tuesday (I think it was), Rod called Marshall but had to leave a voice message. He explained who he was, that Ed had given him Marshall's name, and overall a very inviting message about wanting to see what they could do for Marshall. He left his direct phone number (no more leaving messages with the secretary) too. They were finally able to speak on the phone Friday afternoon, and that conversation definitely set us on a trajectory to change our lives forever.
The foundry has zero robots, and Rod was quite interested in Marshall's experience with them from his Denison internship plus the extra curricular involvement he's doing with them right now with Dr. Amari on campus. Rod offered him a summer internship for 2013, and Marshall explained that he'd be interested but did come with some baggage with having a wife and baby. Rod's reaction--"Bring them; we love families!" They would set us up with accommodations and wage, and baby and I could go up there too--spend the entire summer together in the area we eventually want to move to. How much more amazing could this get?!
Marshall's going to send Rod his resume, which I'm sure will make him like Marshall even more considering his military and computing backgrounds. Rod wrapped up the conversation by saying that he definitely wants to keep in touch with Marshall and build a relationship with him through 2014. Wow!
We went out to dinner to celebrate and talk about how this will affect our future. We see nothing but positives here. After Denison, we decided that we would not move there or take any possible job offer from them upon Marshall's graduation. We discussed what to do about next summer, and decided that if Marshall had an opportunity to do an internship out of state, we would have to all go together because I didn't want to be left here alone in Austin to raise baby during a very critical time in his development. Not to mention how lonely Marshall and I were without each other even with visits every 2-3 weekends. The only way all of us could go together would be if we found someone we trusted to house-sit for us, and we couldn't think of any viable solutions. We decided that Marshall would stay here in Austin and hope that a local opportunity for an internship would arise probably in a non-foundry industry. In the very least, we could raise our son together and he would program full time for income. Now, by going to Spokane and getting our expenses paid for plus a wage comparable to what Denison paid him, going up there sounds like the best option. We're going to talk with cousin Mitchell, who is a year younger than me, and who just moved to Austin 3 weeks ago and has been staying with us, if he would consider staying at our house for next summer.
I texted my Aunt Lorraine, who lives in CDA, that I had good news and wanted to call. Uncle Jet and Grandma Barbara were also on speaker phone when I shared with them the news of the day and that we might be up there for the entire summer next year. We had planned on going there for a week in early August. It's going to be so amazing living closer to them; my heart rejoices because I love them so much, and they will be such a positive influence on Merrick. They were all really excited! Uncle Jet asked how me coming up for the summer would affect my job, and I said that we plan for me to be a stay-at-home-mom (SAHM) after baby is born. Then thinking about it more, this would be a really good reason why I couldn't come back to work for Pentagon. My FMLA leave will be from December 21st to mid-March, but then if I went back, it would only be for 2 months and then I would be gone for the summer.
All this excitement is the reason I'm awake at 5am on a Saturday. Can you blame me? :)
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