You Can Always Go, Downtown

I've successfully completed two weeks in my new professional career. "Success" is a very ambiguous term, but I feel comfortable declaring a successful two weeks because I have not yet been dismissed from the role and zero people have threatened to beat me up. Every day that no one wants to beat me up (or at least makes this threat to my face) is a victory.

First, I'd like to thank everyone who has wished me luck and encouraging words on my new endeavor. Changing jobs isn't necessarily an easy thing to do, especially when you like what you did do, and encouragement is very...encouraging. That makes sense.

Second, my usual apologies for the reduced writing over the last couple of weeks. There was a time many years ago when I envisioned a time where enough people were readers that if I took a break, be it for vacation, laziness, or a terrible case of diarrhea, hearts would break across the state and possibly even the greater Midwest. Now that I'm slightly (I said slightly!) less of a moron, it is abundantly clear that, if anything, the world is a happier, funnier, and more Michigan-appreciating place when I am on break. Based on this, you may just be lucky enough that I more regularly contract terrible, terrible cases of diarrhea. How lucky that would be for both of us.

Third and finally getting to the point, let me just say how awesome it is to work in downtown Detroit. Really, no fooling, working downtown is the greatest surprise of the new work. It was something that I was originally looking forward to, but it is even better than I anticipated (you are not allowed to hold this against me when I have to make the painful commute from Northville to downtown Detroit in the middle of winter as opposed to the zero minute commute of working from home and I complain about it as I most certainly will do). Our offices are in the 34th floor of the Guardian Building (pictured above), which is just a few blocks from the RenCen and Cobo. From the window I can look out from my seat, I can view the Ambassador Bridge, the Detroit River, Joe Louis, and Cobo. From our conference room, I can see Campus Martius, Ford Field, home plate at Comerica, and pretty much all of metro Detroit out to the Silverdome. It is beautiful gazing across the land I love. On top of the great outside views, I was shocked the first time I walked into the Guardian Building and it looked like this. What a great building.

So all this is great. However, there are many other things about working downtown that I never really appreciated until I was based there. I've spent quite a bit of time visiting clients downtown in my past life, but it just isn't the same. There is an energy about working in the heart of our state's biggest city that adds some real excitement to the day. It's also kind of amazing who you can run into by constantly being downtown. A few days ago I had a catch up lunch with a friend from high school who is in a building right near mine, and he introduced me to the city deputy ombudsman who was having lunch where we were. That was random, but something that certainly would not have happened in my underpants on the couch in my home - or if that did happen then something seriously wrong happened in my life or that guy's life.

Detroit is not respected as a place to live or work by people both in and out of the state, and it isn't the nicest downtown out there, but I love it. My dad has worked downtown his entire career and he has always talked about how much he likes working there, and I couldn't fully understand it without having a similar experience under my belt. I've only been at it for two weeks, and I'm anxious to experience more. That might be asking for trouble, but that's all part of the experience.