Hello, World!

Writing is a skill, a muscle that needs to be exercised in order to stay fit. In the past 12 months, most of the writing I've done has been resumes and cover letters. I'd like to return to something more fun, so I'm giving blogging a go.

In that time, I've also been learning to code (hence the title of this post). It's really turned my world upside down, since I always assumed it would be too difficult to learn without proper schooling. How glad I am to have been wrong! I won't claim to be a computer wizard yet, but I've had a lot of fun creating animations in Javascript, simple webpages in HTML & CSS, and databases in SQL. I'm trying to decide how far to push this, since my social science background has somewhat disappointed me career-wise. I'm just not excited by the things that life offers, whereas the possibilities are nearly endless with technology. And this is what I want to do: travel the globe solving problems with technology, or in low-tech scenarios, with innovative thinking.

I've never been one to publish my opinions online. I had a science teacher in middle school who warned us against posting stupid things on social media because he knew people who'd lost jobs and college acceptances from that. I think I took that to heart a little but to much, however. And then when I wanted to join the national security apparatus, wow, did I really go overboard with purging my online presence. Admittedly, wiping my twitter was smart because I posted some very puerile things. Not mean or morally offensive, just plain dumb. Well, there were a few things I retweeted that I thought were funny that I now disagree with, but that's what a decade of growing up does for you.

Regardless, I'm glad I've found my way back to putting things out there, putting myself out there. This is me forcing myself to build a positive online presence. I create things - music, graphics, terrible business ideas - all the time and never do anything with them. Even if they go nowhere else, I'd like to have a place to claim them as my own.

So if you're reading this, it means I've found the courage to publish my site. I'm glad you're here. Welcome 😊