Two years ago I wrote a month-by-month recap of 2007 except so much happened that year it felt appropriate. While 2009 witnessed an important milestone for me I’ll receive a more casual approach.

Upon returning from winter rest the realization that my time at Stanford was just six months away truly hit. At this point I was completely immersed in power and greentech courses and market trends. Apart from fleshing out new venture ideas of my own organizing the Social Entrepreneurship Business Plan match was also kicking into high gear. I was also working part-time back at Apple helping to get the new interns up to speed. In February — in the depths of the stumbling economy — I decided to turn down a job offer from Cypress Semiconductor boldly stating “I didn’t come to Silicon Valley to take the safe way out” (only to join Apple 7 months later…). That was a hard decision but one that I’m glad I made. February also marked the end of my father’s 40 year working career; he visited India for the next couple of months. School was becoming a blur — all my energy related classes were projects based I pushed and helped execute a truly ambitious film project for Hindi class I was attending more events off-campus love the ThinkGreen forum trying to figure out what to do behind graduation the Social E-Challenge eating up more time like we got closer to the competition date.

Visits by my friends helped kept me sane and recharged — in those last two quarters at Stanford I saw Mike Donny Mark and Jennie Greg and Kelly my corridor-mate Eddy from Sweden Jordan and Laura! (Bonus points to Greg and Kelly for making a trip just to see me! hehe) I also got to see Melih Brent and Tim more often. On campus I enjoyed getting to understand a entire new group of people who were interested in energy issues that were in all my civil and environmental engineering courses.I also grew closer to the people I already knew on campus. The tick-tock-tick feeling that looms through an impending graduation can be dreadful.

Graduation came with a piece of paper stating I (miraculously) had a diploma from the Leland Stanford Junior University and my family came to the Farm. A little bittersweet though for a last minute frighten back in India saw my dad depart for India before the graduation ceremony. The four of us also went to Tahoe for some hiking — so pretty.

So what to do now? Brent and Abhi back at RTI were kind and let me do some part-time working on a project so I worked on that while continuing the job search. For the past few months I (and tens of thousands of other soon-to-be-graduates) had been looking for job opportunities; startups companies or even new ventures. I eagerly sought out greentech companies but the recurring line I got was “we think you’d be a good fit but we want to wait 6/8/12 months before hiring since we’re not sure how our project load is going to be with the current recession.” Not very encouraging. The world was gray…I was between worlds. Still living in my on-campus apartment through the summer but no longer a student. Not sure what or where I’d be in the next few months. In my heart I wanted to stay out in the Bay Area but what if this request for a position at the renown National Renewable Energy Laboratory in the Boulder region of Colorado goes through?

Then Joseph called me up and wanted to meet for dinner. Well this was interesting. Over the next few weeks I sought opinion and perspective from everyone I spoke to. The advice that resonated with me the most: don’t undervalue the fact that you love working with the people there. That is actually a rare thing and appreciate it when you can.

A room for rent opened up in a Stanford friend’s home in Menlo Park so I transitioned there for the drop while starting at Apple. I got consumed by job and loved living with Troy Michael and (effectively) Karla. Troy was busy working on his iPhone app and writing his book Mike converted to full-time as Box’s lead mobile developer and our evenings routinely featured new recipes on the stove and hours of ping-pong. Talked hours of university football with Troy Melih and Matt. I got to see some of golf’s great players at the President’s Cup tournament with Melih and Matt too. My grandmother visited America and I visited home for Diwali. I decided that I would move up to the City and started spending more weekends in the City. I was delighted by a day spent up in San Francisco with Peyton. In mid December Dad got the call from India and was on a plane the next day for his hometown of Akola. A few days later my grandmother passed away.

Finally spent winter break back at home. Went out on the town with friends and had a terrific time for the 25th birthday and got to see them more before the eventual return to California. It’s hard for me to represent the feeling of seeing and being with my friends back here; it’s like slipping on a favorite pair of well worn shoes after a long absence. They’ve been with you for countless miles places and situations and will never let you down. It makes me feel like the luckiest person in the world.

So what’s next for 2010? I now feel good and confident about a few aspects of my life — I graduated from college (for real) and have a great job that I love. Now while I love living with Mike and Troy I’d like to find a place to live that I can feel more settled in. And finally at the top of my goals for 2010 I want to finally start paying attention to my personal life. Although I’ve just hit the quarter-century milestone  I know there is so much more I have yet to experience in life.

Now let’s get to it. Happy New Year and best wishes to everyone! Thanks for reading.