The Dawn Of Acension

Under extreme heat and pressure, carbon becomes diamond.  You could say there’s been a little operational duress in my situation lately. The greatest by far occurred when 30 short days ago, the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen appeared in my life (my daughter). She picked a hell of a time to arrive. I was absolutely swamped that week; I received the sort of “time off” where you are still basically working;  while living in the hospital room for a few days I was glued to my laptop banging out code and answering the never-ending stream of email.  For most families Daddy jets right back to work while Mommy and the baby are at home. But since I base from home- me, my life partner and the kids have all had to cohabitate here for the last month. This is no easy feat under normal circumstances but when you add hormones, sleep deprivation and crying children into the mix it becomes a recipe for disaster.

What goes first is your concentration. It is almost impossible to preserve a work environment for yourself and keep strong focus on tasks. You develop a kind of ADD which is made much worse by the lack of sleep.  You feel as if you are not firing on all cylinders, loping along at 75% of capacity. Creativity and capacitive thinking sapps. You fall instantly asleep when napping or drinking red wine.  A fog of war rolls across your  mental map of your applications and systems. Your patience wears to a thin wire and your temper flares. A old friend was kind enough to lend me use of a desk in his office twice a week… without this luxury, I surely would have gone insane. You really take the ability to focus in a work environment for granted until it is gone. And when restored, you work like a demon straight out of hell.  Because I sure as hell wouldn’t trade my girl for the work she’s doing- and I try to let her know as much a possible I respect and appreciate what she does.

The icing on the cake of course is that it’s finals week. In addition to being a Dad and a fulltime VP of Tech of a major Ad Agency and cofounder of a Startup I am also a student. I have a test worth two letter grades tomorrow morning; the study guide is looming from my other monitor as I write. My plate is good and full and heavy right now. But to cast me as some cork tossed hither and thither in the sea of life is melodramatic and inaccurate. At the end of the day I take responsibility for my actions. I could easily take drop out of school, shutter my startup, cushy up my career and just coast. Take a couple long vacations. But the failed ambition would pickle me inside. Call it pride or arrogance if you want but I want to be remembered for more than my ability to pay bills and raise my children. The bar is much higher than that actually. As they say, aim for the stars, hit the moon. Onwards & Upwards.