Peter Rosenthal Talks Family Ties

Peter Rosenthal, 29, has been through more than 30 states. “And I’ve yet to find lamb and potatoes made the same way as in Greektown,” says the West Bloomfield native, who lives in Los Angeles and plans to move to Santa Barbara in the next month. He works remotely for a company in upstate New York writing software for next generation airport baggage scanners, and is transitioning into a software job working with atomic force microscopes.

A 2005 University of Michigan graduate, he left Michigan for a job with General Dynamics in Tallahassee, Florida. He went on to work in Virginia, where he lived for more than two years, and then went remote. “A co-worker invited me to move out to California and see the sun more often,” he said of his current location on the West Coast, which he says is “a very acquired taste.”

He says he misses his tight-knit family the most, including his new niece, Stella. “It's a hard trip to make from LA to Detroit too often; she keeps getting bigger in leaps and bounds every time I see her.”

Last home in February, he says he has thought of moving back. With his brother in Birmingham working as a lawyer and the new growth he’s seeing in area business, it would be a possibility if the job prospects improved, he said. “After traveling around the country and visiting others, I haven't been able to find anywhere quite like the metro Detroit area.”

His parents recently bought a new house in the Farmington area and his whole family got together, one of his favorite recent Detroit memories. “Everything about the day was positive and a foot or two of snow had just settled outside,” he recalled, adding that even the seasons seemed like a treat.

“It just felt like something I was missing from my life, and something I'd like to have back. A sense of peace that comes from knowing the people around you understand you and the relationship goes beyond just a group of friends out for a drink.”