Becoming The Browns - Part 3

The Date: December 1998

The Place: Chicago O'Hare International Airport

The Event: Mr & Mrs Brown meet each other for the first time

Yes, that's right. We met at O'Hare. It wasn't as random as it sounds but it's still a cool place to have met. We were both interviewing at the same company. They were looking to hire several hundred new associates over the course of the year and were interviewing large groups - probably 50-75 people at a time. The routine was that candidates would be flown in, driven to the hotel, given a nice dog & pony show dinner, and spend the next day interviewing, touring the offices and being wowed by their hospitality.

As I mentioned in Part 1 - I had already graduated from college but was looking for a full-time job after leaving graduate school. So even though most of the other candidates were college seniors I managed to get in with that group. One of my good friends from college (and soon-to-be roommate) worked for the firm and recommended me to HR. After a phone interview I was selected to fly out to Chicago for a 2nd interview.

As I mentioned in Part 2 - Mr Brown was running as fast as possible from the Motor City and interviewing at a lot of Chicago companies.

This is what brought us together that day at O'Hare. I had flown in from California. Mr Brown flew in from Lansing. We happened to arrive at the airport around the same time. We made it to the limo pickup area at the same time. And since the limos were taking candidates in groups of 4 we ended up in the same car - me, Mr Brown and two other students from Alma College that he was friends with. One friend - Byron - we still keep in touch with. The other friend was a female. A girl Mr Brown had a little thing for. This was not "the girl". No, she was back home in Michigan working away.

So the limo ferreted this motley group of us away to a beautiful hotel in Chicago's North Shore suburbs. It was Christmas time and everything was decorated beautifully and had that Christmas-y feel to it. Since we arrived at the hotel at the same time, Mr Brown and I were assigned rooms next door to each other.

Now, now.... I know where your mind is wandering to. Shame on you. It was nothing like that.

We had several hours until our dog & pony show dinner so the four of us wandered the grounds of the hotel (it was more of a hotel & resort). I had a great time getting to know the three of them. After dinner, they were looking for a fourth person to play Euchre. If you aren't from the Midwest, Euchre will sound kind of funny. But it's really a quite simple card game of trump - sort of like Hearts. I had only played a few times in college but my rusty skills came back to me. We stayed up late (probably not the best idea before a big interview day), ate pizza we had delivered (I'm guessing dinner was only mediocre) and played Euchre. It seemed quite obvious to me that Mr. Brown and the female of the group were playing a little flirting game. No matter to me - I didn't know these people and wasn't sure I'd ever see them again. We didn't exchange contact information and if we'd made different employment choices our whole lives might turned out differently

As it turned out... we were all offered jobs with the firm. I took my job and started right away - January 1999. Mr Brown was still in his last semester of college. He and Byron accepted their offers and started in summer 1999. The female companion didn't accept the job. But she did move to Chicago...