Jeremy Young discovered Portland as a coffee drinker and a rock climber.
“I came here on vacation in 2002, and I really liked it and couldn’t stop talking about it,” Jeremy said. “My hotel was at the Marriott, so I would always go to Pioneer Square for my little coffee and do the crossword.”
Other conference participants told him about a rock-climbing spot on the cliffs at nearby Rocky Butte.
“You’ve got to rappel down into it, and there are little bouldering problems,” he said. “If you invent the climb (route), you get to name it.”
Jeremy has rock-climbed throughout the country and even named some climb routes in Alabama.
“I’m not going to say the names because they aren’t very nice,” he said in a low voice with a smile.
“I really did like rock-climbing. It was really beneficial for me,” Jeremy said. “It was an exercise I liked doing. It was very social. It was outdoors, which I like. A little rock-climbing vacation goes a long way.”
He hurt his shoulder rock-climbing and “finished it off” when he fell off a ladder on a construction job.
Jeremy worked 80-plus-hour weeks as a construction worker and waiter in New Orleans and as a cook on an offshore drilling liner in the Gulf of Mexico. He also helped a friend open up a coffee shop and was a partner in a business installing custom furniture.
“In New Orleans, I had better networking skills,” he said. “A lot of it was about drinking and going to bars. It was kind of like how things got done, how plans got made.
“I’ve had some mental issues come up, as I’ve gotten older,” he said with a sigh. Mental illness runs in his family, and he said he deals with anxiety and addiction.
“I do a lot better when I’m sober, so I’m working towards that again,” he said.
To calm down and anchor himself, Jeremy uses meditation techniques, which he learned at a retreat based on the book “The Way to Love” by Anthony de Mello.
“It’s all about awareness,” Jeremy said. “If I had the money, I would buy the book for every single person I cared about. I’ve bought it for Christmas for friends and people before. (But) I think it’s something you have to find yourself to appreciate.”
His battered copy was stolen along with his backpack, so now he goes to Powell’s Books to read it.
“I’m just kind of in the middle of a bad time,” he said. “As I get older, I get less ‘bounce-backier.’
“My next step is complicated because I don’t think it’s just about housing,” Jeremy said thoughtfully. “If housing would have solved the problem, I wouldn’t have wanted to go back out on the street. So I think my next big step is – I don’t know exactly what that is.”
But Jeremy said he does know this: “Pay attention. Take opportunities. Say yes. Saying yes does a lot of good things for me usually. I’m going to try to do that and what I can for the moment.”
Jeremy said yes to this interview on the spur of the moment.
When asked what he would like this vendor interview to include, he replied, “My rugged handsomeness,” and added, “Maybe a sense of humor would be fine.”
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