Griffin at Mountain Hardwear

Latham’s story reminded me of the way Griffin’s early childhood was intertwined with Mountain Hardwear’s early days. Mountain Hardwear began on 11/1/1993 or so. Griffin was born on 7/10/1995 about 20 months later although, of course, he had an impact some months before that.

 

Thanks to supportive co-workers, I could cut my office schedule to Monday, Wednesday, and Friday and worked from home on Tuesdays and Thursdays...the days my wife, Wendy, taught at College of Marin. The only problem was the Tuesday Managers Meeting that required me to come into the office. Griffin came with me in a sling and I’d participate in the meeting with him napping and strapped across my chest. Occasionally a leg, arm, or head would pop out of the sling and the meeting would pause until he settled back into his nap. 

 

The final part of the ritual was hauling him out to the warehouse so Joe Stadum could weigh him in the UPS scale.

 

A few years later, we were at parent’s night at Griffin’s preschool/childcare center. In a discussion with other parent, my wife, Wendy, proudly announced that Griffin had never had candy.

 

“Well, actually….” I had to admit that Griffin had discovered candy and cookies at MHW. Once he was mobile, he found folks he liked to visit when I had to haul him in to work. At the top of the list were Kimiyo and Shiu Mei, the sample makers, who kept tins of sweets precisely for this type of visitor.

One last tale. We shared a nanny and then preschool with some good friends whose daughter, Maia, was born just 10 days later than Griffin. Maia and Griffin were then around four, if I remember correctly. I had them for the day because the preschool was closed. I needed to go into the office and do a few things.(Computer systems are like farm animals: they demand attention at odd times whether it’s convenient or not.) I stashed the kids in the conference room / showroom with paper, crayons, and such and headed for the server room to spend a critical 15 minutes feeding the machines.

 

I returned to find they had pulled down all the sample sleeping bags and piled them on the floor. Then they’d taken off all their clothes and were leaping from the conference table into them.

 

“We took off our clothes,” Maia announced brightly, “because WE WANTED TO!”

 

Must have been the prevailing West Berkeley hippie backpacking mojo still in action.