While I don’t claim to be an Arctic explorer, I do think that I am on the verge of something special, something in the era of Storage, Virtualization and Cloud Computing age that has not been found yet by many companies.  What that is, I’m not quite sure but I hope by taking a leap in the direction of a company in which encompasses my own values and passion I will reach what I am looking for faster.

Twitter like newspaper ads of the past I had learned is a good way to hear about new opportunities.  For example, here is the text from an add in the early 1900’s that wanted to find people to join an Antarctic expedition:

“Men wanted for hazardous journey. Low wages, bitter cold, long hours of complete darkness. Safe return doubtful. Honour and recognition in event of success.” – Ernest Shackleton, Sometime around 1900″

And here is the Tweet I saw early January in which I responded to:

“Any Storage Linchpins out there looking for a career change? We need you, our customers need you, apply within..dont be shy. #Varrow#EMC” @virtualtacit Jan 4, 2011

I love history.  History exists to teach us how to live our lives going forward.  What we can learn from Antarctic exploration is that eventually, as we keep trying something we will eventually reach our goals or inspire those to reach them for us in the future.  Ernest Shackleton indeed never reached Antarctica, however he did bring a crew of men to the bitter cold and was stranded about 16 miles from his goal.  What he did afterwards is what was amazing.  He took the lifeboat leaving his crew behind, sailed almost 500 miles away and back to eventually bring his whole crew home, safe.  This epic journey inspired hundreds to try and eventually live in this harsh climate.  As of today over 30 countries have permanent research stations located in Antarctica, a testament to the early explorations done by Shackleton and others.

“How Shackleton maintained his men’s morale while stranded for months on the ice and when there seemed no hope of rescue, eventually bringing all of them home safe and sound, is now seen as an achievement unique in the history of exploration.” – James Caird Society

This coming week I start at Varrow. Whilst I can’t claim that Varrow will provide the danger (except during dodgeball tournaments during the Quarterly Oil Changes) that times of past exploration had, I do believe it is now time to explore myself as a person and my abilities as an Storage Engineer.  Varrow is the leader in storage, virtualization and disaster recovery.  They do this by hand picking top engineering, sales and operational talent to support customers throughout the South East United States.   They truly are a VALUE Added Reseller and understand what the V means in VAR.  I experienced this first hand at Varrow Madness earlier this year and you can also see some of the customer testimonials on Varrow’s ‘Our Customers’ section on their or should I say our website.

I am looking forward to the coming weeks, months and years and what holds in this period of self exploration of myself and my abilities in my career.

“You hear the call or you do not, but if you do, you have to experience it.” – Donald Sutherland – The Last Continent,  2008