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A Raz Family Update


So it’s a long ways coming, but anyways here’s our update. It’ll be a quick entry, one because at the end of the day nobody really cares THAT much to know the minutiae about our move, but I still have people who text or email and say “dude, where did you go?”

Where we went: New Jersey. Neeeewwww Jeaaarrssaaaaayyy!

Side note: my daughter, Zoe, recently said to me very sincerely “Dad, now that we’ve been here a little while shouldn’t we start talking like them? Like, shouldn’t I start saying “yooooous” instead of “you”? Ummm, no Zoe. Absolutely not. Please don’t even let those thoughts creep into your head.

So on June 1st I started as CEO of DealOn Media, a VC-backed start-up company that is in the Group Buying space (competitors that you might have heard of include GroupOn and Living Social). Here’s eight months of summary at what we did at DealOn: bootstrapped, built great technology, secured some big partners, didn’t close a few big partners we should have, made some brilliant decisions, made some lousy decisions, built a great team of incredibly-talented-and-highly-committed people (this was really the key success factor), tested and trialed to figure stuff out, figured more stuff out, got some momentum, and along we went until we unexpectedly and very rapidly found ourselves in a position where we started to get approached by a lot of buyers.

And, last week it was announced that we were acquired by ReachLocal. I never expected that we would get acquired within eight months, but we did more things right than not, we got a few breaks, we built and accomplished some pretty cool stuff, and we landed with a very successful publicly held Company that’s full of exceptional talent, passion, and commitment. Things I dig. So my Board and DealOn investors are (very) happy, I’m quite certain all of my employees are happy, and I think the buyers are happy…so, therefore, I’m pretty happy. While it wasn’t all fun and games (though we did have some fun, too), this has been one of the most stretching and adventurous business experiences of my life.

Here are a few links to the announcement:

http://www.screenwerk.com/2011/02/15/reachlocal-buys-dealon/

http://www.clickz.com/clickz/news/2026544/reachlocal-buys-dealon-plans-deals-exchange

http://www.socaltech.com/reachlocal_s_zorik_gordon_on_daily_deals/s-0033998.html

So, I left Olympia the end of May, and Erica and the kiddo’s came out in August. We’re at a temp location in Western NJ, and while we miss the West Coast immensely there are quite a few nice things about being on the East Coast–including being much closer to three of my sisters, Erica’s dad, and a MUCH shorter flight to see my parents (at one point on the West Coast we’d gone years since seeing them, and now we see them every few months).

There are things that I really love about being out here (like, that I’m able to write this from a coffeeshop in Manhattan and adore the energy in this town; I literally think my biochemistry changes when I drive through the tunnel to get into Gotham).

And there are things that I don’t love about being out here (like, working out at the gym w/ the natives in New Jersey. It’s not normal, and it’s an experience I hope you can bypass).

But, all in all, it’s part of the adventure we’ve been on and I’m grateful for every minute. Hour. Day. Okay, at least every week. 🙂  Seriously, I’m very grateful. And I’ve met some incredible people out here who have changed my life in so many ways.

Erica continues to homeschool, in an environment that isn’t that homeschool friendly or resource laden (“okay, now, which cult did you guys say you belong to again?” I promise, peeps, it’s not that weird; but it was way easier in the NW/Olympia where SO MANY people homeschooled); Royce is booting away the soccer ball in between reading books (I LOVE that she wanted her 9th birthday party to be a “bookstore birthday party” where they all got together at Clinton Bookstore to read and share stories out of books. Go Royce Go!). And, Zoe, ahhhh little Zoe. She’s more creative than ever, has turned into an aggressive little basketball player, and completely adores cooking (often but not always with me, and she’s an avid Food Network viewer). Ahhhhh, I miss our Oly kitchen! She could watch cooking shows for hours on end. It’s pretty darned cute, and I think it might be her gift.

Longer than I expected (it always is), the Raz Family update. The adventure continues…

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9/11: Dreaming with a Broken Heart

We spent the weekend of September 11th in New York City a few weeks back (for those still trying to figure it out, I moved out East in June and took a job to run a start-up company, our update in a forthcoming post). I was in the City all day Friday for meetings, one that was supposed to last 90-minutes which continued for eight hours. By the sixth hour of meetings, with no end in sight, I told E and the kids to come into NYC and we’d stay the night. We’d already planned on getting up early to drive in to spend the morning at the 9/11 memorial. By the way, before I dig much deeper, please note all photo credits go to the amazing photographer and writer Jodi Kendall; www.jodikendall.com

We had a great night that evening over Tomoe Sushi during the kick off of “Fashion Week” in Manhattan, and the following morning we awoke early and caught the R subway line down to Rector Street, but not before taking the kids to a typical Manhattan-style coffeecart (“regular” with two sugars for me and E), a kaiser roll with butter, and an everything bagel w/ cream cheese. Kids loved it.

Riding the subway south brought back so many memories; the hotel we stayed at Friday night was, literally, less than 300 yards from my old start-up company in midtown (right by Macy’s, 35th and Broadway). And I used to take that exact subway from our apartment, departing from Rector and jumping off at the 34th street. On this particular day, Saturday,  September 11th 2010, I was doing the reverse commute nine years later, down to the area where we lived during the event.

As the subway clickity clacked from stop to stop the late summer smell of the subway brought back so many memories; a smell of heat and humidity, sweat and metal, urine and basement…Oddly pleasing yet borderline nauseating. Like skunk.

“Rector Street, Rector Street next stop! Brooklyn-bound R-train last stop in Manhattan” barked the conductor, and I wandered ahead with one kid in tow tightly wrapped around my hand, and another kid being corralled by Erica. I can’t remember which kid it was, but I was squeezing her hand so tightly–never forgetting for a minute the time I saw a guy fall into a subway that came all too close to being crushed by an oncoming subway train. As well the time when I was ten years old in Chicago and having a guardian angel change my life as a result of a near-death subway experience. I’ll forever compensate for those experiences by overprotecting our kids in subway stations. It’s now in my DNA. It’s interesting how life’s experience dramatically change you. Sometimes, in ways that you can’t or won’t let yourself change.

As I started to walk out the subway on the gum tattered steps, the morning sunlight rays streaking through the underpits of Manhattan transit as I climbed the steps, I forgot about kids, work, my wife, and my life.

Transcendence, I think is what they call it. The colloquial definition, not the Kant definition.

And I was lifted back to nearly 10-years ago on such a crisp summer morning; this Saturday was no different. I walked over to Broadway, one block south of our old apartment, two blocks north where the World Trade Center used to gallantly stand. And the memories flooded. As did the emotions coming with it.

Sorrow, at the tragedy that happened years ago.

Inspiration, to be able to see and hear again the stories of so many people who were so valiant during such a difficult part of time.

Anger, at not just the events that occurred years ago, but also those who used the day as a platform to espouse personal political belief, like those who maintain a conviction that 9/11 was an “inside job” to the  drama around the mosque as well as proposed burning of the Koran’s (all of which I also have personal opinions about, but the 11th was a day to memorialize those lost–not to use as a platform for  political gain or statement-making).

The sights and sounds so powerful, the air resonated deep with conviction. I’d been downtown since the actual attacks, staying in our apartment a few blocks south of the WTC after 9/11, to our move out of the City a month thereafter, to various visits over the years. But, Saturday, well, Saturday was different.

Trinity Church, made very well known during the events of the day and thereafter, lined with flowers and luminaries memorializing the many who passed.

Feeling the methodical notes played with the breath of human life through the bagpipes singing solemnly in the background as we walked closer to the memorial.

The quiet rustle of people walking by, calmly and contemplatively, with shared glances of an understanding of the sacred ground on which we stood.

Hearing, name after name after name, hours and hours worth of names, read by family and friends for those whose lives were savagely claimed.

Seeing the bright morning sun eclipse through the 9/11 memorial as I stood with both kids and Erica by my side, near my sister Jodi, as I stood with many others and simply cast a gaze upon the worksite of regentrification as well great sorrow.

Watching other Americans, one with a British accent to my left, an Arab-American to my right, a group of Amish Mennonites standing behind me, with every other imaginable nationality in close proximity, all paying tribute to those whose time had past.

An experience that can’t be articulated or “explained”, but something that, again, has changed the way that I look at the world and our life.

It was, simultaneously, not enough and also too much.

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