Chomping at the Bit to Say Nothing in Particular

I used to be a painter. I don't often paint anymore. I keep a small kit of watercolors and another of acrylics around in case the mood strikes me. The mood doesn't often strike me, I'm sorry to say. This is something of a small shame because I was a pretty good painter in the sense that a lot of people would have to work really very hard to do what came easily to me.

I know what the other side of that is like from trying to play guitar. Each and every chord is a struggle for me. I'll likely never be remotely competent on the gitbox, no matter how hard I try for a few weeks, then put it aside for a month or two, and then start trying real hard again for a few weeks more, and so on. That's alright. I can live with it.

I'll never be a famous guitar player. I wasn't ever going to be a famous painter either. I'm sure I've said all this before. I had talent, but talent is easy to come by in this world. A lack of savvy and proper connections proved to be more challenging obstacles for me. I'm pretty damn savvy now, but connections remain elusive. Art for the sake of money didn't appeal to me either. It felt sticky. That's probably a common sentiment among many artists. The more successful ones generally don't have this hangup. Good on you all.

I don't have any hangups about programming for money. I like programming a lot. I can do it for hours on end, day after day, and never get bored. It's a dynamic and challenging field. I can study the subject for decades (and I have) and always find something new and well-beyond my knowledge. Frankly, it feels as though some new and challenging something or another comes out at least once every two weeks. I'm pretty good at programming too. I have a talent for seeing how large systems come together while at the same time maintaining an eye for fine details. I don't feel the least bit sticky about doing it for dollars either.

On the whole, I like photography best. I'm a better painter and a better programmer than I am a photographer. I'll definitely never be famous or even a professional photographer. I won't be famous because I'm not all that good at it in the big picture. And I won't be a professional because I'd rather shoot myself in the face than shoot wedding photography. There's nothing wrong with wedding photography or photographing weddings. It's just very much not for me. Wedding photography is of course a euphemism for commercial photography. Again, nothing wrong with it, but it's not at all for me.

So I write code for a living. Coding is a decent way to put a roof over your head. It's a compromise, for sure, but it's a good compromise. It's fun and it pays pretty well. Of course, the downside is you always feel like the world's biggest dummy, because there's so much to know that you can only ever know just a tiny bit of it, no matter how hard you try to learn it all. Anything worth doing is intimidating at first. Anything worth devoting your life to should be impossible on a good day.