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So I'm lying here dozing after reading bits of Neal Stephenson's Cryptonomicon, and I'm wondering what is it that I'm really accomplishing by taking the Visual Basic .NET class. It feels partly like an attempt to hold on to a job that is changing, like trying to ride the back of polylycanthrope, holding on until it finally dies of not being able to evolve into something stable.
I have this image of the syntax and arcane words of programming being able to transform the glow from the computer screen into gold, or maybe at least silver. But the people I deliver it to don't feel it's shiny enough, or quite the right color. I tweak some of the symbols and make it more like they think they want it, but it's never enough, and not something I can keep myself and be proud of. Only product.
Even worse is the feeling that comparing myself to a wizard (or even a wizzard) is greater fallacy. (Is penis envy just a phallacy?) That there is no great connection to the hero's quest in the day-to-day activity of work, play, sleep. Or if there is, that it is the call to adventure long denied until I am trapped in a tar pit, too old to break free. Trapped by gooey but hardening substances in the dark until the position I hold begets a newly contracted job ripping out of my chest.
And again, the feeling that none of these dramatic statements are really worth anything in the face of needing to clean a kitchen, support a family financially, support friends emotionally. Maybe the real work of my life can't be compared. Have I traded my soul for these things? They seem to be the right things to do at the time.
I have to wonder what strange dream prompted this. It's been quite some time since I've felt this way. Things are not going badly for me, and it's only in the wake of waking that these thoughts came at all. Perhaps it's merely an alien point-of-view, a warning from my Jungian consciousness not to let go of what creative forces I have left. Or something I ate. The ghost of failure may be just a bit of fish soaked in too much malt vinegar. I'll see how I feel tomorrow.
I have this image of the syntax and arcane words of programming being able to transform the glow from the computer screen into gold, or maybe at least silver. But the people I deliver it to don't feel it's shiny enough, or quite the right color. I tweak some of the symbols and make it more like they think they want it, but it's never enough, and not something I can keep myself and be proud of. Only product.
Even worse is the feeling that comparing myself to a wizard (or even a wizzard) is greater fallacy. (Is penis envy just a phallacy?) That there is no great connection to the hero's quest in the day-to-day activity of work, play, sleep. Or if there is, that it is the call to adventure long denied until I am trapped in a tar pit, too old to break free. Trapped by gooey but hardening substances in the dark until the position I hold begets a newly contracted job ripping out of my chest.
And again, the feeling that none of these dramatic statements are really worth anything in the face of needing to clean a kitchen, support a family financially, support friends emotionally. Maybe the real work of my life can't be compared. Have I traded my soul for these things? They seem to be the right things to do at the time.
I have to wonder what strange dream prompted this. It's been quite some time since I've felt this way. Things are not going badly for me, and it's only in the wake of waking that these thoughts came at all. Perhaps it's merely an alien point-of-view, a warning from my Jungian consciousness not to let go of what creative forces I have left. Or something I ate. The ghost of failure may be just a bit of fish soaked in too much malt vinegar. I'll see how I feel tomorrow.
