Rescue Training

Sol and Kimberlee Zira went on a charter sailing excursion near Williamsburg while visiting from the Los Angeles area. She was anxious because their dog back home in Sherman Oaks had been mauled by a pit bull and required more than a hundred stitches. Her mother was caring for the dog while they’re away. Anxiety rose as a US Coast Guard helicopter circled us on the York River and proceeded to descend on a nearby moving boat to simulate a rescue operation. (You can see the trainee emerging on a line connected to the boat.)  This went on for an hour as they drifted downriver, over the horizon. It’s all part of the Yorktown Coast Guard Training Center.

They each have two grown children, and they’re wildly successful. “Our children were friends in high school,” Kimberlee said. “After Sol’s wife died, they suggested we get together and perhaps take in a movie.” Today they’re happily married.

Sol picked up the story. “When my son was at MIT, his fiancé had different sleep patterns and they didn’t want to use an alarm clock since it would wake the other one up. She invented a watch whose alarm is a vibrator that doesn’t make any noise.

“Her professor told her to drop out of school and develop it for market, and MIT put up $10,000 in venture capital. Today they work in Palo Alto, where they live in half of a small garage. It rents for $2,000 a month for maybe 500 square feet.  Now they’re CEO and CTO of a Silicon Valley start-up that has branched out into the weight-loss apps that have become so popular. It’s called Lark.com.”

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