The Chapter Three gang is assembling in our Eureka office for a few days of long-awaited retreat, teambuilding, and planning for the future. It’s not quite Drupal in Paradise, but it should be pretty fun and productive. As long as I’m geeking out about work, my new favorite thing is the awesome graphic Monica whipped up for us:
We actually have a tree in our SF office now, so that’s pretty exciting to be all in-sync.
Check out photos of the new office, if you’re so inclined.
I need to seriously get my rear in gear on some copyediting, but this is pretty exciting stuff.
I decided to take a peek at my google analytics the other day, and I discovered that by far and away the most popular post on my site over the year to date is one I’m actually rather proud of: Me And Maslow’s Pyramid of Human Needs Down By The Schoolyard. Almost 1000 people have seen that so far this year. Even assuming half of them were robots (and hey, robots need philosophy too), that’s still immensely gratifying.
Its no secret I’ve been burning the candle at both ends lately. When I come down to SF it tends to get worse, feeding my workaholism. Even though this is ostensibly a thriving cosmopolitan metro area, I really have no life here, and with an office it’s easy to stay at work to the point where coming home is just a trip you make to sleep before getting up to do it again. It reminds me of the MFA days in a way, or college. Any of those times when I was doing stuff for 16+ hours a day and having no sex.
Not that I’m complaining. Coming home late and hungry and unable to find a can-opener to make myself some tuna salad notwithstanding, I’m a ways away from the point where this pattern really generates any kind of meaningful irritation or negative response. Indeed, for as long as things can be kept in the power curve — never forever, but what is? — this isn’t a bad way to exist. It makes me productive and relatively happy w/feelings of accomplishment, etc, and possibly even provides good grist for later milling when time is less tight.
And still, I can’t help but feel like something is slipping past me here. I mean, the impending birthday is probably driving these feelings, sure, but I can’t shake the sensation that I’m whistling into oblivion. I can’t help but note the toll my current pace of activity (and past times of uber-business) put on my existing relationships, the massive impediment it poses to forming new connections.
To put it another way, I’ve never fallen in love in the midst of a workaholic bender. I’ve never even come close, to the best of my recollection. I’ve generally been frustrated and lonesome. It’s a startling and embarrassing admission of mortality, but apparently my own tender human flower needs time and space to unfold. Who would have thunk it.
Back in March in Boston, I shared a meal with my friend Kate, and she told me about a dinner party at which the initially-suspect hostess (a psychiatrist or psychologist or some other consciousness manipulator) orchestrated the initial chit-chat around a series of questions designed to lead to meaningful table conversation. It turned out to be quite a winning program. One of the questions asked — and one we discussed as quite an illuminating query if one takes it seriously — is that of “what is it really that gets you out of bed in the morning?”
Whether you’re one who’d rather stay in bed, but you’re coaxed/driven out by some feeling, or the type who just can’t stay put, or even someone who’s depressed and feels like they’d just rather call it off for a day, we all rise and meet the world at some point. Why? What is it that prompts or provokes us to expend that human effort? What is it that fuels our first conscious acts? It’s a fascinating question to ponder, and a revealing one to share.
For me the gut reaction, and one I don’t love to be honest, is that there are things and people that count on me. Shit will get fucked up if I don’t get out of bed. There are many other amazing reasons to love being alive, some of which I feel from time to time, but that’s what that causes me to rise and meet the day: responsibility and obligation.
Now, I can spin this as a positive thing, and it’s arguably not a bad character trait to be responsible, to feel a sense obligation, noblesse oblige even. Still, in my heart of hearts I feel this is evidence of a huge problem for me. While I clearly do have a sense of obligation, and it works, and I can appreciate how responsibility figures large into the larger arcs of life, I don’t really believe that this is a sustainable state of things for me personally.
For as long as I’ve known myself, I’ve been motivated by my passions and ambitions. While those are clearly still in play, I feel they’re increasingly dulled, sublimated, subsumed under various auspices. My starry eyes are all but extinguished, my grand sense of ambition whittled down to positive fiscal growth. That’s no way to be. It’s rather sad, actually.
In any event, the conclusion I came to whilst pondering this on the BART is that I should probably do some things for myself. I have no idea what those things might be, but it seems necessary (if not necessarily right) to root around inside for some purely selfish motivations, and see if they can’t be satisfied.
So, it’s this kind of head-space that I take with me to the deserts of SoCal, for a bonafide vacation weekend. It’s good timing, really. I’m hoping that a change of scenery and company will help jog my thinking further.
The taxman cometh. I just forked over about 52% of my total take-home income from the past year to the federal government and state of California. This is where having a business that works out becomes painful, though I can’t help but think that a more devious accountant (yes, more devious than a ninja) could have done at least a little bit better.
In many ways the deck is stacked against us entrepreneurial types. We’re taking advantage of the simplest and most flexible business structure, the LLC. We still pay self-employment tax, and our desire to build up the business and hire people means we’re leaving money in the bank that we could be taking for ourselves, yet the IRS considers that as profit from a business and personal income whether we draw it or not.
So in an effort to expand we knock ourselves up a couple tax brackets without increasing our take-home pay a cent. I’ve been saving for it since last fall, but it still feels mightily deflating. No refund for me.
Oh well. First-world problems. If you’re on the other side of the great class divide and wondering what to do with your Bush Money, here are some neat ideas.
…But I’d give up my soul for just one of them now…
It’s been a packed week down in the Bay. Wheeling and dealing, painting and sanding, whooping and shouting; the whole nine yards.
Went and saw The Avett Brothers on Friday night. They’re pretty great showmen as expected, and I got me a t-shirt — a much more effective way of supporting working musicians than paying for their music, btw — but I felt the concert could have been more. Slims is not my favorite place to see a show, and the crowd vibe was a little off. That and I had great expectations, which is generally unfair and I try not to do for the sake of giving artists a chance, but c’est la vie. That’s what you get for being real good.
They were touring on 2007’s Emotionalism, which is a great album, the first one I heard — coming via Pickathon and Chelsea late last summer — and probably the most natural cultural fit for SF. But having been exposed to their entire catalog, I celebrate the mo’ twangy stuff a bit more fully than that which leans indie. The crowd was on the other side of that leaning, didn’t seem to know a lot of the other/older stuff, and just wasn’t as lively as I’d hoped.
I suppose I was looking for something really wild and free, like when we saw The Devil Makes Three at the Starry Plough last month. That was hot and packed and foot-stomping scream-along-singing until you got light in the head and then another song would start up that was even better and more worth jumping around to; lather-rinse-repeat. By contrast, the crowd’s energy at this gig made it tough to even break a sweat. I also felt the encore was a bit too scripted, and there wasn’t sufficient demand in the room to draw out a spontaneous second round.
High expectations, see? Still, well worth it overall. They’re touring forever and I’ll bet next friday’s Portland show will be a real winner. I’d be really curious to see what a home-town Carolina crowd is like:
I attended with LGD, the designated-driving Lande-man, and another sociologist friend of theirs, a pretty lady from Mexico headed to a Cambodian/Vietnamese border town this summer on a grant, getting the kids together via soccer. Pretty neat. They swung by the office to pick me up which is the first time I’ve been able to show it off to any of my friends, which I found myself kind of proud to do. We had Hardnox (soulfood) and then SparksPLUS (dangerbooze) out behind the loading dock before heading to the show; a pretty pitch-perfect evening in the dogpatch if you ask me.
After the concert, me and the boys retired to the Cornell Club, where Lande and Luke played guitar while I tried to stay lucid in the living room. I feel like I aught to learn to sing some songs. I’m not likely to pick up a very good instrument other than maybe the tambourine, but I want to participate in the whole music thing when my friends get into it. I’m no Sinatra, but I had enough training to front some folk tunes. Even if I’d known some, Friday night probably wasn’t going to work out owing to the late hour, etc, but in general it’s something that I could probably do a decent job at.
After staying up until around 4:30am with the guitar and shenanigans, Saturday’s sun was a harsh wake-up call five hours later. I try to resist the narrative of aging, quarterlife crisis (will I live to 116?), or whatever you like to call it, but there’s nothing that brings it down on you harder than realizing you’re totally spent after only one night out on the town. You grows up and you grows up and you grows up, I suppose.
The Girth is gone at a wedding this weekend, so it’s just me and LGD. We got it together for Yemeni coffee from our spot around the corner — good stuff from bright eyed smiley guys with awesome beards — talking about various strategies for meeting pretty ladies, etc. This is something I’ve lately been trying not to think about, seeing if the “watched pot never boils” adage might work in reverse. As an antidote to overthinking everything, I’ve been letting myself get carried away with work, tipping down the parabolic descent into what looks to be a very busy couple of months.
That’s probably a poor tactic (as opposed to, say, hanging around the Berkeley campus more, which is what I suggested to my man) but my hope is that there’s some kind of crucible to be had, that maybe I’ll emerge on the other side with a new brand of mojo. I feel that a confident and loving perception of self is a vital component to any romantic success, and being into it with the job — as opposed to grudging or beat-down — is a step in the right direction, even if it does put me at the particularly American risk of conflating career with life.
In keeping with that, after Yemeni coffee, I rallied with the Zacker and we did some handyman work at the office. Our big goal was to patch a hole in our bathroom wall which was made when we tied into the water/drain lines to add a kitchen sink on the other side. It wasn’t huge, but it was vaguely of peeping-tom-ish, which nobody really wants. Victory achieved: fiberglass tape and spackle are a powerful combination. We also cleaned up the network and the conference room. Ready to start adding more people now.
Upon returning to the East Bay it became readily apparent that Saturday night would be a mellow one, grand schemes for getting out on the scene notwithstanding. We watched Talladega Nights, which I thought was kind of amazing. Adam McKay and Will Farrel learned some lessons from Anchorman, it seems. The writing here is vastly less self-indulgent (if still fairly undisciplined) and aims much higher. At it’s best it achieves a kind of highbrow/lowbrow synthesis that’s rarely attempted and hard to pull off, but highly rewarding when achieved. I’m not sure how it was taken by racing fans, but the parody here seemed both respectful and deep, which is in keeping with the overall idea. I had relatively low expectations, and was pleasantly surprised. Compare and contrast, yaknow?
Anyway, that and an early bedtime was Saturday. Sunday is now, and the week begins again. I’ll probably spend most of the day nerding-out, maybe watch some basketball, get set for the days to come.
This is my new hat, courtesy Molly Dove, which I debuted at the Cornell Club housewarming a few weeks ago. I’ve come to really like it. It’s hip but not too hip. Nerdy but not too nerdy. It keeps my head surprisingly warm, the sun off my face, and I can choose whether to sport it at a jaunty rakish angle or straight-ahead squaresville. I think it’s quite fetching.
It’s also a good one for the figurative “hat” I wear at my job. For the first year and a half of our bootstrappy startup we operated under an implied “everyone does everything” organizational strategy. This works when it’s just the three of you, and it’s good for keeping managerial overhead down and equality high, but ultimately people have talents, and these are distributed unequally. Specialization is necessary at some point if we’re to grow.
For the first year of our work I had an informal (and largely unwanted) authority position as the oldest and most business-experienced member of the team. It was not the greatest fit as I have no particular desire to be the boss, and I haven’t been living in the same town as my partners. It was what it was and I’m glad things worked out as well as they did, but nevertheless I’m happy that things are changing.
To wit, the defined roles are going to emerge. I’ll be working more and more on the technical side of things; not necessarily writing more code directly, but taking designated responsibility for the code that our (eep!) employees will be crafting. Matt has already taken over the general operational management of the business, as his personal drive and passion for todo lists makes him a natural fit there. Zack is returning to his strong suit of evangelism and high-level Drupal architecture; he’ll be out in front of our clients and working in pair with more (eep!) employees in the office to guide them through implementations and up the learning curve.
I think it’s a good way to break things down. We all have our own power positions. Matt keeps everyone on-task, Zack controls the relationships that drive our bottom line, and I get to draft the code that’s ultimately what we’re selling. It’s also going to make it possible for us to grow up in a meaningful way. As I mentioned, more employees are on their way, and a Humboldt County office could well materialize over the summer. In spite of all the economic doom and gloom, we’re expanding!
All of which is making the job more exciting again, which is nice. I still need a vacation, but feeling excited about the future prospects — rather than being in the “grind it out” mode — is a much needed and welcome change.
Spring Awakening is a famous pre-expressionist German play by Frank Wedekind, revolving around the onset of puberty among some schoolchildren in a deeply repressed 19th Century community. It has a new life as a somewhat simplified or dumbed-down Broadway musical. Since I first read the text about a decade ago in College I’ve been borrowing the title, which has an appealing lyrical quality, as a shorthand for the semi-cyclical (re)emergence of my lust for life.
It is the vernal time again, and Humboldt County isn’t disappointing. The sun is shining, and last night I went out to a kick-off party for our nascent roller-derby league. Our friend Hanna is participating (around her regular gig down in SF learning to tattoo; that’s dedication) and there are a bunch of other good second-degree connections. The place was loud and full of ruckus, rock bands and dance-teams, a silent auction of art, desserts and donated items. With a minor amount of cronyism and a little but of quick bargaining, we managed to score a truly atrocious/awesome USA USA USA blanket: the flag, the eagle and a FDNY truck marked 911. Made in Korea. Amazing.
It was the first night of spring and also the full moon, the club chock full of attractive people with ambiguous sexual agendas. Mine was/is rather nonexistent. Much as I relish the return of the sun and the verdant fertility on display all around me, to-date I’m personally untouched. I’m sure that if I gave myself enough rope to get all boozed-up and wild like the old days there’s an odds-on chance I could hang myself sufficiently well to at least make out with someone. It’s an occasionally appealing thought, but it hasn’t happened.
These days I’m traveling more regularly than ever. I’m trying to hire people. The muscles on top of my cheekbones involuntarily twitch from time to time, which I assume is stress-related. As is to be expected of such desperate declarations, my new-years resolution of “less work, more sex, flossing” is falling flat. Even the flossing has become spotty, though twice a week is much better than never.
The above reads like a complaint, and I suppose it is, but actually I’m feeling pretty upbeat lately. If I quit cudgeling myself for being such a workaholic for a second, the sweet kick of being busy and engaged lifts me up. I have a feeling something similar would happen in my pants if I quit preemptively busting myself down for being a Lothario. It’s an occasionally appealing thought.
Work and Play: New Perspective on Relationships
On top of being conventionally successful, the process of starting a business with two other equal partners has been an incredible learning experience. It really is a relationship, and not always an easy one. We’re friends, just like you’d want in most any relationship, but there’s a whole lot more being piled on top of that friendship.
I realized the other day that this endeavor has gone on far longer than any sustained romantic relationship, and that I’ve been undeniably more generous with my time, energy and patience in building the business than I have heretofore with matters of the heart. Not that I see (or want to start seeing) Love as a business proposition, but it is a revealing contrast.
Another aspect of this is the how these various pursuits intersect with the inner drive of my ambition. The connection with work/career is fairly obvious, but it occurs to me that in my more romantically prolific days much of that action was aided and abetted by my desire for personal accomplishment. It’s a crappy and egotistical thing to admit, but for a lot of my young adult life I wanted to prove myself a good lover. It was a brass ring to reach for, and that was part of what drove me.
Today I don’t have that ambition, nothing to prove. Indeed, getting back to that preemptive bust-down I mentioned before, I’m more worried about just what might happen. While I have theoretical ambitions to be a family man, that’s not the sort of thing that translates into day-to-day real world behavior. Indeed, to the extent that this ambition creeps onto the scene in influencing my actions, it’s more of a buzzkiller than anything else.
To conclude, I really need to loosen up and have some fun. Probably that means setting some boundaries for myself, figuring out a more reasonable goal to reach for. Is there anything wrong with just having a good time? And isn’t it through simple acts of openness and joy that greater truths and possibilities are uncovered? This is what my experience tells me, and what my written beliefs profess. My habits of action are currently misaligned; have been for some time.
The question is how to let go lightly, forget the cheek-twitching stressors and let myself be once again swept up in the truth and beauty all around. Good question.
It’s two steps forward, one step back. I’ve made it back to the old homestead and have gotten this project out the door (a rather big site) that’s been eating my brain and soul for the past couple months. I got locked into a cycle of grinding it out, which can be effective in the short run, but yields diminishing returns over time. I did about ten weeks with no weekends or days off save two for thanksgiving and two for Christmas.
Workaholism is in my DNA (dad and his famous 90 days straight in the oilfields, mom and her neverending string of projects, etc) but this was not the way I like it; too disorganized and haphazard. Too much struggling. The most important thing is to stop struggling. Stress-dreams and exhaustion don’t help anyone out.
However, we did get it done, so people are happy and that’s a win, and as it was at the same a rather spectacular failure in terms of process, there’s a lot to be learned. Blowing it is how you get smart, so I’ve got that going for me too.
And of course, with this weight lifting, everything else bubbles up like an over-active bottle of orange crush.
Mark reminded me of this quote the other day:
“innocence must die, if we are ever to begin that journey toward that greater innocence called wisdom.”
I feel kind of stuck in the middle there. Innocence is dead, but wisdom has yet to arrive. I’ve been having a lot of anxiety lately about how life seems to be moving in a direction of dispersion, people all going their separate ways, spreading out over the map and settling down. Even though I’m part of the problem here (maybe because I am), this makes me sad.
It seems like a ridiculous cliché, but I think I’ve always subconsciously thought my grown-up life would be like living on some kind of commune. Back to my roots!
This seems rather unlikely, though. Ridiculous when I say it. Nobody really wants to live on some weird compound, including me — or at least not until after the Red Dawn — but I think there are aspects of that life that make sense to hold onto. I mean, really what I want is some kind of community, some kind of extended notion of family.
We like to joke around, me and my guy pals, that “part of becoming a man is watching your dreams die.” It’s a less-true, more bravado and sarcasm-laden riff on theme of that quote about innocence. For better or for worse (worse) I seem to be laboring without dreams of late, dithering on the doorstep of wisdom.
Can I consciously improve my life? Can dreams be reborn? Will I catch up on my sleep and energy deficit? Will I make any progress with my new years goals beyond flossing? Only time will tell.
