jason miles lorimer dot com

a website is an island — this is a living document created — at forty years of age

who i am

born in Philly to a bartender and a cab driver the year before Reagan got elected — they would call my birthplace urban and my neighbors lower — middle-class back in those days.

started my education as the only gentile in a Jewish kindergarten, attended a private boarding school with other student-athletes from around the world — finished up my formal education at the largest public high school in Philadelphia —intentionally skipped college and I don’t regret it.

tell me more

• unabashed design snob — known to be annoying about it.
• ambidextrous with blue eyes and a genetic mutation that caused my hair to turn grey as a young man —all three irregularities have proven useful.
• lost my younger sister and my favorite aunt to an opioid overdose.
• once half-hysterically meme’d with a flattering picture in front of the famed Michigan Central Station — trended on twitter twice since then.
• fervent activist for at-risk children — trained as a mandated reporter and will soon graduate to a court appointed advocate.
• tend to think about the day to day quality of my life atmospherically — calm my anxiety with aesthetic and by way of exercising my mind.
• cinephile — grateful to be alive in the age of the internet so I can watch good movies and — any documentary — as fast as people can make them.
• 1990’s and 2000’s hip hop aficionado; street + formal fashion nerd.
• single, no children, never married.
• travel ranks high on my hierarchy of needs — five Continents so far — Antarctica and Australia still to go.

trying to do good work in the sphere in which I operate

what i have done

• 10 — raised more money than any other elementary school student in the country for Easter Seals and got invited onto the television news — where I embarrassed myself — and no, it is not up on YouTube.
• 12 — recruited all the newspaper delivery boys in my neighborhood to streamline delivery, billing and collections.
• 14 — leased a kitchen and started a pizza and sandwich delivery service for my fellow boarding school expatriates because the single shop available in town was poorly managed.
• 16 —lobbied the local business community to restart the dormant high school newspaper and became the editor. I recently discovered it was still in operation and that feels nice: like drying off in the sun out of the pool.
• 17 — managed a 15 person sales and installation team at the now defunct Circuit City, in the car stereo and alarm department.
• 19 — started a residential alarm installation company and grew it into three markets with thirty employees and contractors — eventually selling our monitoring accounts to TYCO (ADT).
• 25 — consulted on a failing 22,000 square foot nightclub through a bankruptcy process and reopened it with a renovation and new brand.
• 27 — built and ran a boiler room operation for a mortgage brokerage a couple years before the housing crash.
• 31 — partnered with a student founder from Temple University on a consumer-facing technology company — pivoted the concept, raised venture capital and exited successfully — the company remains operational in Downtown Detroit.
• 33 — created a multidisciplinary team to work on civic and social challenges, and because I was bored of work that didn’t matter to me.
• 34 — leveraged design and technology to help elect the Mayor of the City of Detroit on a write-in ballot.
• 36 — purchased and period-specifically staged a historic lumber mansion.
• 39 — wrote an early campaign strategy document for the Democratic candidate, now Governor of the State of Michigan.
• 40 — lived in a carriage house in the woods of Pennsylvania while reading all the books I always wanted to.
• 41 — wait and see or reach out — would love to work on something together if I am available and interested in the subject matter.

write me at jasonmileslorimer@gmail.com

what i have to offer

writing about how you might be exceptional feels much like tweezers to pluck a rogue nose hair — it is painful and requires you too look far too closely at yourself in the mirror.

that being said:

• have a knack for connecting disparate ideas and translating a vision.
• hyper-competent generalist and prefer working with the same.
• efficient at identifying freelance talent and managing remote teams.
• understand how to locate and secure donations and investment capital.
• proficient in design — atoms and bits — interior and exterior.
• secret weapon is my silver tongue — capable of selling ice to an Eskimo.

musings and curiosities

reading

• Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely. (Behavioral Economics)
• The Biography of Charles Schultz (Peanuts)
• Revolution in the Air by Max Elbaum. (Radical Left of the 1960’s)

watching

• The Putin Diaries. Interviews with Vladimir Putin by Oliver Stone.
• Ozark: Jason Bateman is an American treasure.
• 1917: the single-shot camera work is mind-boggling.

most people don’t know

• once did a three month run — playing the character Fagin in a traveling production of the play: Oliver.
• ten years ago I co-wrote a book on a few of the ways social media will shape business models and commerce in the post-industrial-age.
• collect presidential campaign ephemeral and propaganda art.
• pitched three innings and manned first base in the Little League World Series Tournament.

favorite compliments

• your hair looks like ice cream.
• being referred to as witty or acerbic.
• thank you for your help.

learning resolutions

each month I pick a new topic to study — scan everything I can on that topic.

• april: studied how the ride-share industry is affecting reported instances of drunk driving.
• may: learning about virtual reality technology and how it can be used as a tool for issue translation and fundraising — an empathy machine.
• june: looking at the effects of privatization of social and criminal justice departments in cities and counties across the U.S.
• july: understanding how technology is evolving inside local police departments. (think autonomous paddy wagons and imperfect facial recognition software.)

lifelong dreams

• play a role in three political campaigns: a mayoral, gubernatorial and presidential cycle — to win all three races — I am already 2 for 2 — figure this is my best shot at a New York Times obituary; because even posthumously I will be preoccupied with aesthetic.
• to stay healthy and live long enough to do all the cool stuff I have in mind. I want my friends to find their best life and for my family to live forever.

thanks for coming by to see me