Remembering Jennifer Lam - an open letter to Theresa and Brandon Lam

Dear Theresa and Brandon Lam -

My sincerest condolences on your loss. I've known your mother, may her soul forever rest in peace, for about 5 years now. We both worked for Sun Microsystems, and although we lived over a thousand miles apart, we worked together very closely on several different projects. I got to know her well, but probably in a very different way than you knew her. Jennifer was always a huge inspiration to me and the whole team, for many different reasons, and I wanted to share those with you.

First, she always had a smile on her face, and always spoke with a tingle of a chuckle in her voice. This must have been very hard to do, since the late 2000's were very hard and lean years at Sun Microsystems (and in the technical industry as a whole). Over time, we saw more and more of our colleagues be laid off, more and more projects fail, for all of us it was always easier to frown than to smile, but Jennifer always maintained a positive attitude, and encouraged the rest of us to do the same. Her smile always rubbed off on us, cheered us in her own unique way.

Jennifer also always stepped up above and beyond her responsibilities, and did whatever was required to get the job done. At one point, we decided to release our application to our site around dawn Eastern Time (so we could minimize impact on our users). I assumed those of us on the East Coast would take on that responsibility, yet Jennifer cheerfully volunteered to take care of it. Jennifer woke up early, and implemented our weekly pushes at 5am, never complaining. Her rational was that she could work for a couple of hours before you woke up, which allowed her to spend a couple more hours with you during the day.

At other times, when our work load exceeded the normal working hours, Jennifer would work ridiculous hours to get the work done. I remember several 2am chat sessions we had..

I've never heard the words, "I don't know how to do that" from Jennifer. In the technical industry, it's quite normal for us to be exposed to stuff that we don't know anything about. Many of us, however, avoid tasks that we don't know or understand, preferring to stay in our "comfort zone", rather than take on risky endeavors. Not Jennifer - she had a unique ability to learn extremely quickly, and was never afraid to accept tasks, knowing that she'd have to learn quickly (and under pressure) and adapt in order to get them done. Her passion for for constantly learning and adapting to the changing times inspired the rest of us to do the same.

Jennifer was also never afraid to try anything. One time, during a group get together in Menlo Park, we voted on what activity we should do, as a group, "just for fun". By a slim margin, the group decided to go indoor sky diving. While this wasn't Jennifer's choice, and she had the "what are they, crazy?" kind of look, she went along, and as always, had a smile on her face when she jumped in there.

Whatever she learned, Jennifer was always willing to share and teach the rest of us. If we were stuck on something, even though Jennifer had a busy schedule, she'd always take the time to teach, mentor, train, and support her colleagues and teammates.

Even though it was far from her job responsibilities, Jennifer also was the "honorary mother" of our engineering group, always keeping track of the details, always making sure that the rest of us were organized and knew what we had to do and how to do it. She always made sure that the docs were up to date, procedures were documented, knowledge was shared, and that communications happened. Truthfully, as the manager of the engineering group, many of these tasks were my responsibility, but Jennifer had the natural passion and talent for doing this.

In her last year of employment at Sun, I was honored to rate Jennifer a "1", the highest rating possible at Sun, meaning not only did she consistently exceed expectations, but also performed better than 90%+ of her colleagues. Jennifer regularly excelled during her years at Sun, and received this rating more than once. She truly was an outstanding engineer and teammate.

On the personal side, whenever we traveled (which we had to do a couple of times a year, typically to the San Francisco Bay area), Jennifer always prioritized time for her family. During the afternoon and early evening (which would have been your late afternoon and evening hours), we'd always see Jennifer spending hours on the phone, talking to you, listening to you play the piano, talking to you while you were in bed, the same way as if she were right next to you. It was clear that she loved you beyond all things, and you loved her.

I'm hoping that this gave you a glimpse into a portion of your mother's life that may not have been visible to you.

May her soul and spirit be comforted. Wherever she is now, I'm sure she's watching and protecting you. At the same time, I'm sure she's working hard, preparing a home with the same love and attention to detail, waiting for all her family and friends to join her.

Jennifer - your mother - will always be on my mind. Every year form now on, on May 4th, I will light a candle in Jennifer's honor and memory, and remember all the happiness and good that she brought into my life.

Regards Always,
Ari