We've been apart for some time now. It's okay, us both doing our different things, in different places. Time continues to pass. I just heard that a bright and cheerful man younger than myself, that I knew on the periphery of my social circle, was rear-ended and killed while passengering to the airport. It's strange to know that someone I barely knew, I will no longer ever know. Time is passing, but that's what it does. I wish I got to know him better, but I didn't. Condolences to his family, for what they're worth. The machinations of life and death are strange indeed. Chaos and causation and grief. Lost uber driver pulls over and makes bad traffic decision = life ended. Elsewhere, first pedestrian killed by self-driving car. When making decisions, consequences are unclear. Time is moving forwards. We can't live our lives paralyzed by fear, or regret. So it goes.
I've been tossing the idea in my head lately that a career shakeup is needed and in that shaking a few possibilities have popped up. Why do I feel that what I'm currently doing is not enough? My pay is on the lower scale of things but certainly enough to live comfortably, and yet I often feel like a change is necessary. I struggle with the temptation to move on to something different mostly because the fact is that I generally enjoy making custom cabinetry. It's a joy to transform raw ingredients into something beautiful, similar to cooking a good meal. And yet somehow I feel miscast in my current role. I often fear for my physical safety using powerful cutting tools and handling hazardous materials. Maybe that's it. The long-term view. Sometimes the chaos of things catches you.
In exploring a possible new direction as a programmer/software developer, I've been reading the book "The Keys to Success and Long-Term Fulfillment" by George Leonard. His essential argument is that long-term, deliberate, tedious and sustained effort is what leads to mastery and fulfillment -- but this mindset is undersold by mainstream consumerist agendas that focus on selling quick fixes by exploiting anxieties. I agree that maintaining attention to diet and exercise, doing regular yoga, meditation and group support (in whatever form that takes) are the keys to healthy living. Yet we are often tempted into the easier solutions of fast-food, sedentary lifestyles, ignoring stretching, and distracting ourselves with solitary digital entertainment. We are tempted to look for quick fixes with pills, surgeries, diet fads, and social media attention as a way of cheating out of doing the simple but hard work of daily attention to basic needs. We are increasingly distracted and averse to simply focusing on doing basic things well. If I can find the zen in coding as I do in handling a hockey puck, perhaps it will be a long and fruitful journey.
Until next time in the cyber swamp,
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