Overall I would say that coding brings me joy, but if I'm being honest, it's also escapism. Sometimes you drift from just doing what you love to wrapping yourself up in it, hoping never to be found.
It's bizarre and wonderful that I can write code as a hobby. As someone who works in a highly regulated field where casual dabbling is prohibited by law, the fact that I can participate at all has always been remarkable to me.
I've watched goal-oriented devs transition easily to LLM-based flows, but process-oriented devs are really suffering. It's easy to say that I can write code however I like, but that isn't how it feels.
The feeling is like being on a long bus trip, and suddenly, without explanation, every other passenger lights a cigarette. When something is ubiquitous, you can choose how to interact with it, but you can't choose whether you interact with it.
It's a world where I'm in control, so of course I prefer it to the one I can't control at all—of course I prefer it to a universe of ceaseless obligations and bureaucratic tedium. I'm forced to ask: was it ever really about shipping software?
Increasingly I have thoughts like 'What if you just got really into yoga or cycling instead?' Such a suggestion would have been unthinkable to me in the past.
Speaking of which, my son is utterly stoked about the F1 race in Melbourne this weekend. Without a shred of evidence, I've decided that it's Kimi Antonelli's year. See you all in a few days :)
In any event, it's been weeks since I made meaningful progress on any of my projects. I don't know if it's just a lull or if I need a change, but I do know that I need to start prioritizing my health—I'm increasingly aware of the tangible impact on my kids if I don't.
