Farewell to an Eternal Spring

After two and a half years, I have left San Francisco, my tech job, and my life there.

As stereotypical as it is, I kinda wish I had a nicely packaged story. Like a Silicon Valley story from ramen to riches. Or a forbidden romance between a Marina bro and an Oakland hipster. Even a cryptoheist with a ragtag group of rejects could work.

But I don’t have a fantastical tale.

I have my 972 days.

Those days were, to be honest, the best of my life. This includes everything from the people to the places to the daily absurdities. The times falling on my face in Tahoe, those drunk serene sunsets on Corona Heights, dancing with strangers in the Nevada desert, and even the mornings dodging buses and crazy taxis in the tumultuous seas of Market Street.

Of course there were the bad days, too. The lonely walks. The endless rejections. The friends I hurt. The situations I took for granted.

I’m sorry.

Through the good and the bad, I did learn about myself. The amazing power of “yes”, but the necessity of “no”. A growing sense of empathy. How it’s okay to be weird — my weird. And, perhaps most importantly of all, what type of people I want in my life.

And yet here I am; gone.

It was nice while it was. The comfort of an eternal spring made staying easy. The mirages in the ocean fog made going hard.

But spring wanes and fog lifts. What do you do then?

For me, I needed to go.

I want some time to work on my mission to empower creators with modern software. I’m going unemployed to make some baby steps in this direction. Short term that means making examples of creative software products like data journalism, visualizations, and audiovisuals. Long term it is working on novel techniques such as generative design, isomorphic codebases, and visual coding.

I want to try the freedom of being solo. This means seeing more of the world and embracing the uncomfortable.

So please excuse me; I need to grab my coat. There’s so much to do.

All my love.