May 4, 2022 11:34 PM
what I want
Last week, I went on a company sponsored vacation to San Diego. I honestly wasn't excited about it at all. Maybe a little anxious. I don't like travelling, and I just wanted to get it over with. We had "fun activities" that we signed up for, but they didn't really appeal to me. I didn't have to attend, but it just seemed like the socially acceptable thing to do.
When I got to the airport and walked over to the terminal, I saw several of my co-workers standing in a circle. They were getting on an earlier flight. I also passed by another co-worker to waved over to me, and I sat with him for a little bit as we waited for our boarding times. As the day went on, I saw more and more co-workers. When I finally arrived at the hotel in San Diego, I saw people that I hadn't seen in person in over two years. And a wave of energy just hit me. I rushed up to my hotel room, dropped off my stuff, quickly changed into shorts, and in less than ten minutes I was back downstairs in the hotel lobby, chatting it up with my co-workers.
Those three days in San Diego were absolutely exhausting, and I barely got any sleep. The food was decent, but nothing amazing. The activities were fine enough. But the people. The people made it absolutely worth it.
What I love about my job isn't the fact that I solve challenging problems and write code. It's the incredibly smart, interesting, and friendly people that I get to interact with. And I've known this for years, but the pandemic had largely taken that away. I'm glad I was reminded of it during this trip.
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In the old iteration(s) of this blog, around 2015-2018, I would always talk about my goals. I wanted to save money, to learn more, to be a more productive person. My life was centered around the things I wanted to accomplish. Lately, I've had a few conversations that have made me think about what I want in my life. Right now, I don't think I want to accomplish anything. I just want to do things that will make me happy.
- I want to let go of work
- I want to cook more
- I want to eat good food
- I want to go on long walks and explore
- I want to play lots and lots of dance games
But most importantly, I want to spend time with others. I could do all those things, but if I couldn't share my experiences with friends and family then it wouldn't make me happy at all.
Life is still kind of a mess right now, with lots of ups and downs. But I'm slowly getting out more, and reaching out to people more. It's way more effort than it used to be just to see people, but I'm going to try as hard as I can to make it happen.