Nothing About Me Without Me

This post will be a mess. Because I keep trying to write it and I keep outlining it to try and make it perfect and I keep using that as an excuse to not write it. So, forgive me in advance, this post will be a mess. I will use the wrong words. The stories will be out of order. It will have incomplete paragraphs, bad punctuation, and run-on sentences. And I am going to let that all go and just dive the f**k in.

TL;DR = I have an official diagnosis of Autism Spectrum Condition now. Tada. And it’s Autism Acceptance Month in April so figured it’s a good time to make a splash.

But what the heck does that mean? And how did I get there? And why am I even writing this and want to share my business with people?

I think I will work through the questions in reverse order. First, start with the why. About two years ago, I think it was, I came across a post via twitter from a woman who worked in technology who had struggled with depression and anxiety and had just been diagnosed as autistic and it changed her world. When I read it first, I didn’t think too much about it. I had been living with various diagnoses myself (anxiety, depression, bipolar disorder), and working in technology myself I definitely have crossed paths with people who I have assumed were autistic. I have friends with autistic kids and siblings, so it wasn’t a new “disorder” to me — but what was new is that this was the first time I had at all heard about female autism. Something in the article was very family and wormed its way into my brain. But then, like with most information I consume, I moved on…because while I identified A LOT with what the woman experienced, and a tiny part of me thought maybe “hey, that might actually be me,” a bigger part of my brain said there was no way I was autistic — I had a job, I could speak in front of people, I was able to function in the real world (okay, well mostly).

But something about that article (and GOSH I wish I could find the exact post again because I can’t seem to find it) just kept nagging at me.

Then last fall, I hit a unique intersection of a lot of various inputs and contexts and conditions and challenges that shoved me forward on the investigation… and I researched more and more about women and autism and for the first time in perhaps EVER I felt like I was seen and I wasn’t a complete failure, disaster, mental case. And perhaps the best part, since I started to understand what really might be going on in my brain (and what had been going on when I was a kid) I was able to be kind to myself and put in place some tools that helped me out immediately.

So why share? Because that one blog post.. because that one woman went out on a limb and shared her story, I had a HUGE breakthrough in my life and, in a way, she saved me. So I hope that maybe my writing will potential help another person out there who has been feeling like me.

The other big WHY is that I hope that people who know me and read this will better understand me — how to work with me, but even more importantly what friendship and love look like with me. Reality is that I am not too awesome at relationships, and folks whom I care about I am sure often feel like I abandon them or I am mean/cold to them, and I am hoping that the more I share about this, the more these folks will understand that I do not intend to do this at all.

The first and second questions (what does it mean and how did I get here?) can probably best be answered a bit together at the same time. I am going to do the quick, timeline version of it for now, since I am just trying to get it all out there right now. And I will come back later for future posts about the details of what this all actually means. So, here’s the story:

• Last November, I started reading about women and autism because I had yet another incident at work where I was misinterpreted as being aggressive.
• The more I read, the more it became very, very clear to me, that this WAS ME.
• But at the same time, I didn’t trust myself and my own evaluation, because hey what do I know? And, as I mentioned, I did not see myself as being like the (male) autistic people I had read about and know and know about.
• So then I decided it wasn’t me. Not at all. I dove back into my life full steam ahead and kept pushing and pushing and pushing. And that caused me even more stress. Lots of tears. Lots of exhaustion.
• I brought it up with my therapist, and while she was open to the information, she was not familiar with adult women and autism and I felt like, once again, it was my job to do all the work and research and explain everything to someone. So…
• I started to see if there was someone out there who could do the diagnosis and help me out.. ideally, I would find a psychologist who could do the testing AND had experience working with adult women with autism who could help me out longer term.
• Found someone (let’s call her Dr. C), and, unfortunately, yeah the official diagnostic process turned out to be bulls**t. It was 100% designed to test if I was a young boy with problems in school. The psychologist who did my testing was also completely lazy IMHO and went ahead and “completed” my diagnosis without even speaking with my therapist — because they were playing phone tag and couldn’t figure out how to connect with each other (yeah, you can only imagine how I felt about that!).
• FORTUNATELY, in the process I found a new therapist who specializes in all of this and after meeting with her for 30 min she knew I was in the right place and I FELT like I was finally in the right place. And also fortunately, I met with her before the BS diagnostic call from Dr. C, and she warned me that the “official” diagnosis will likely come back and say I am not really autistic.
• And, yep, that’s what happened because Dr. C said a.) while I had a lot of traits, I did not show enough repeated motion so I couldn’t be autistic and b.) (this one is my favorite) the way I reported feeling in my “tests” (which were silly checklists/multiple choice surveys) were actually impossible because if I REALLY felt like that I could not live alone and could not hold a job … and since I do both, I must basically be not reporting how I feel correctly. So, I was kinda autistic, but not autistic enough to be autistic AND I can’t be trusted to report my own feelings about myself.
• Dr. C’s recommendations were that I explore therapy, medication, exercise, and meditation — which I found laughable because had she spent even ten minutes with me really listening she would know this has been my life for 25 years.
• and then a few weeks later my psychiatrist made it very simple and just said “here you go here’s your diagnosis I wrote it in your file” and the short version of her evaluation was that the more research she did and the more she knew me this absolutely all made sense. And those diagnostic tests are pretty much BS for adult women

So…. what does this all mean?

It means I have a lot to learn and a lot to share and I have a lot of hope that things in my life will be getting better. It means I am excited and nervous at the same time.

I will do my best to write more soon about the various ways I am impacted by this, how it manifests, suggestions for ways to better work/communicate/be friends with me, and will be sure to share the resources I already have and new ones I come across to hopefully help everyone (especially me!) understand this all better. In the meantime, I ask for your patience and forgiveness.

And, PS, I know Asperger’s Syndrome isn’t officially a thing anymore, but I wish it were because I think I am more comfortable calling myself an Aspergirl than anything else right now.

Top Ten Books from 2020

My boss told me once, “Karen, you just need to figure out what it is you want to do!” I told her I wanted to sit in bed under a nice blanket and read books with my dogs. She told me she meant in terms of my career. I was talking about my career. Problem is, no one wants to pay me to do that.

Someone else once suggested given my love of books I should try and become an editor, or write book reviews. But see, I don’t want to edit or write about books, I just want to read them. And sometimes talk about them with other people who love to read them.

It is in that spirit that I write my list of the ten favorite books I read in 2020. Some were published in 2020, some were not. The list is in no particular order, because I am even too tired to do that. It’s been a hell of year (and yet, interestingly, I read the exact same number of books in 2020 that I did in 2019.. go figure).

Divergent Mind: Thriving in a World That Wasn’t Designed for You
by Jenara Nerenberg

Homeland Elegies
by Ayad Akhtar

Solutions and Other Problems
by Allie Brosh

Luster
by Raven Leilani

The Vanishing Half
by Brit Bennett

The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness
by Michelle Alexander

Nothing to See Here
by Kevin Wilson

Girl, Woman, Other
by Bernardine Evaristo

The Dutch House
by Ann Patchett

A Promised Land
by Barack Obama

Okay so technically that last one I finished reading in 2021, but I read at least 90% of it in 2020, so I feel like it should count! Plus I just wanted to put that cover photo in this post because it makes me so happy. One of the best things I did in 2020 was allow myself to buy whatever books I wanted, including new hardbacks, and do this through my favorite local bookshop (Flyleaf Books in Chapel Hill, NC). It’s one of the Covid/End-of-days/Trump’s final year/Insurrection self-care practices I am going to keep in the coming year as well.

Here’s to more books, more love, less pandemic, less sedition in 2021.

My Middle Name is “Aggressive Tone”

You would think by now this wouldn’t bother me so much. That it wouldn’t hurt. That I wouldn’t have to take a break in order to curl up in the corner and cry for a bit.

But it does bother me. And it does hurt. And it does turn on the waterworks.

One of the reasons I am successful professionally is because I get things done. People value my ability to speed up work, slow down time, activate teams, coordinate disparate groups and workstreams…they say they appreciate my ability to skip all the bs and get down to work.

And then when I step up and communicate requirements, state clear expectations, express gaps in the work, challenge an unstated assumption… you know, any of those things that might possibly make someone feel like they screwed up personally (which btw WE ALL DO – I do it a hundred times a day) I get the feedback, typically from a white dude (but then again, given percentages in my line of work this is likely no matter the situation), but sometimes from a white woman, that my tone is aggressive, patronizing, abrasive.

And each time I TRY to pause, take the feedback and apply whatever part of it I believe is true. Because I do understand that it is critical that my words are received in the intended manner and I can always improve on how I communicate.

I really try to do that. And I do, honestly, but it happens AFTER the anger… and the tears. Because I know that while most likely the person delivering the feedback doesn’t mean to be participating in an unfair double standard and a system that is protecting their privilege, they are.

And it hurts. And I want to just yell back, “You want to see aggressive??? You want to experience what that really feels like?? Come be me for a single evening walking through the city in a skirt, heels, and make-up! Want to feel attacked in the workplace??? Come be the only woman in the room of men questioning your experience directly to your face with each idea you express. Want to feel a bit unsafe??? Experience just for a moment what it’s like to have a guy continue to force himself upon you after you keep saying no, no, no.”

source = everday feminism

(Side note – I stopped wearing heels, skirts (most of the time), make-up and growing my hair long because the harassment was just not worth it)

It’s called Tone Policing. And there are a lot of great resources written about it, so I am not going to bother trying to do it myself when others have already done it better.

So today, now that my tears are done, I will take what I can from the feedback, work on myself because I’m the only one I can really change, and carry on with my typical day.

No, We Won’t Calm Down – Tone Policing Is Just Another Way to Protect Privilege

Infographic: What Is Tone Policing And Why Is It Wrong?

Why I Don’t Have Children: A Mother’s Day Post (w/Wine)

Probably shouldn’t blog and drink. Double probably shouldn’t do this on the evening of a total trigger holiday like Mothers Day during the Corona Experience. But alas, here I go. #EdgeLiving

Fortunately, I am now old enough that people no longer ask me if I am going to have children. I still get the question occasionally if I have children, but typically only during small talk when people first meet me. I think after speaking with me for about 15 minutes most people realize a.) I don’t have any, b.) I never wanted any, and c.) this was probably the best decision I ever made.

I love other people’s children very much. Okay, that is not really true. It’s just a line I have learned to say to make other people more comfortable for my complete lack of a biological clock and maternal instinct. The number one reason I don’t have children — I don’t actually like children. This doesn’t mean I don’t really love my friends’ children, nor does it mean that I don’t love THEM for having children. Not at all. This judgement is not about their lives at all. It’s about mine.

I need A LOT of alone time. Like, a lot. Like I am feeling a bit crowded now even during quarantine (big apologies to all my friends who put up with my continually social distancing – I really do try to respond, I am just sometimes completely out of gas! Please never take it personally). For the first 35 years or so of my life I denied this and learned to play the role of someone who really liked being around other people, because it’s what I thought I was supposed to be doing. I even pretended to be thinking about having a kid, when I knew darn well it was a lie. After I finally owned up to the fact that I liked being alone, and that it was okay to be alone, I ended up being a lot happier. It also helped me understand why I found relationships, like all types of relationships, so exhausting.

I have a great group of friends and a wonderful family and I have what I feel is a lot of love for them. But it is NOWHERE near the amount nor type of love that a mother has (and needs) for her children. The only thing I can even compare that to is the love I have for my dogs, and that very nearly kills me every day because my heart bursts every time I look at their little doggy faces and all I want to do all day is sit with them, rub their bellies, and tell them how much Mommy loves them.

I worry that I may love one dog more than the other, and that I am treating them in such a way that they will know this. This causes me deep anxiety and to mitigate it I make 100s of decisions each day about how/when to show each affection, which food they get when, who I talk to first, more often, and in what tone, who gets what toy, etc. etc. etc. Could you imagine me with human children? Or goodness — both dogs and human children? I would be curled up on the floor in a corner crying every day while all of them were downstairs licking peanut butter off the floor for breakfast.

When one of my dogs is sick, or injured, or even just acting slightly off, my whole body hurts too. Almost ten years ago I had to put down my first dog I had as an adult, Iggy, and it destroyed me. I had to take a full week of work off and absolutely could not function. People tell me this is normal, and I do believe that their understanding of my pain during that time could be interpreted as normal, and something that others go through. But I know that my real pain in that situation is not normal, and not likely healthy. I never wanted children because I have always known there is 100% no way I could ever handle the stress and pain that would come with taking care of a sick child, or dog forbid losing a child.

Kids are expensive. They ask a lot of questions. I wouldn’t be able to travel as much (okay, so can’t do that right now anyway). They interfere with silent reading time. Kids have a lot of germs. The thought of creating a child inside my body creeps me out big time.

People used to tell me things like, “You’d be a great parent” or “It’s different with your own kids.” But I have always known that, for myself, those statements are not true at all. And I am glad that I was able to trust myself in this decision.

Why did I never have children? I never wanted to. I just don’t have it in me. The thought of loving someone like that and being responsible for another human-being’s life quite literally crushes me.

But, seriously, Happy Mothers Day to all those out there who care for others (whether you are a mother or not). I don’t know how you do it!

Saturday Night Thoughts About a Few White Guys

Today I was on a Zoom call sponsored by Swing Left, a great organization working towards defeating Donald Trump and flipping purple states blue (I recommend everyone check them out ASAP). The call featured Cal Cunningham, who is the Democratic Candidate for Senate Candidate in our fine state of North Carolina.

White Guy #1

So, yeah, this guy. He’s a super solid candidate. Served in Iraq and Afghanistan, MS in Public Policy and Public Admin from London School of Economics, law degree from UNC, former state Senator, received an award for his Pro Bono work representing victims of domestic violence an tenants rights abuse. And he’s only a few months older than me, so makes me feel a bit like a failed adult.

I donated to his campaign today. I am going to be volunteering and dedicating as much time as possible to getting him elected and will probably end up spending more time and effort working on his campaign than I have ever spent volunteering for any other candidate, including President Obama.

Why? Because he inspires me? Because I believe in him? Because his platform is amazing? Because he was my first choice out of all the candidates who were running? No. No. No… and No.

He’s running against this guy:

Another White Guy

This is NC Senator Thom Tillis. He. Is. The. Worst. He’s got an A+ rating from the NRA. He is anti-choice and against marriage equality. Even groups of his own supporters starting leaving his side when he voted for Trump’s national emergency declaration that took millions from military construction projects in NC and shifted them to build – you guessed it – the wall. Trump has endorsed Tillis. Enough said.

Add to that the fact that Democrats need to pick up just three or four seats to gain the majority in the Senate (depending on the party of the VP), and that FiveThirtyEight has Cunningham currently seven points ahead of Tillis, and my support of Cunningham is literally a no-brainer.

But you see, this is the candidate I really wanted to support:

Not a White Guy

That’s Erica Smith. She’s a former Engineer with Boeing, and was also a patent examiner in Chemical Engineering Technology. And even more impressive, she is a public high school math and science teacher and the current NC State Senator from the third District. But… she… yeah.. she’s not a white dude.

She lost in the primary. The DSCC basically met with Cunningham behind her back and endorsed him. She was just too much of a risk in the current political climate (see above, Tillis/Trump/Senate Majority/End of our Democracy if this s**t continues/etc). Cunningham was seen as such a significantly bigger threat to Tillis that a GOP super PAC that is associated with Mitch McConnell actually funded efforts in NC to help Smith in the primaries.

Let that one sink in a little. Two extremely qualified candidates. Smith is more progressive, and remember, not a white guy. Cunningham more middle-of-the-road, oh, and a white guy. And as if Smith didn’t have enough of an uphill battle, she’s seen as such a potential disaster for the Democrats in the race that the friggin’ Republicans fund efforts in her favor because they know that had she become the Senate candidate, there was basically no way Tillis would lose. But sure, the playing field is level.

So, that’s the long-winded way of explaining how I got myself here — 150% behind this guy:

The First White Guy Again

I feel like I am being asked if I would rather have a wilted ice-berg lettuce salad or a Clorox-smoothy, when at the same time there is this amazing vegan buffet sitting behind a glass wall that I have to pretend I just don’t see.

And don’t even get me started about these two:

Two More White Guys

I mean, I get it, it’s not like we had any better choices. He was the only one. Well, him and Bernie.

That’s it. Nobody else.

Not White Guys

Can’t imagine why I am so angry all the time.

Biden 2020

Cunningham for US Senate

#BlueNoMatterWho

An Introvert’s Happy COVID-19 Isolation List

Please don’t read this the wrong way. I am not happy that COVID-19 is here, that it has caused so much sickness, pain and death, and that we will feel its economic impact for the unforeseeable feature. I also VERY MUCH recognize that I am sitting in a position of great privilege — I own my home, am employed by a tech company that is decently still in demand where most of the company already worked from home, and I have access to plenty of food, clean water, masks, hand sanitizer, toilet paper, and had I needed to go to the doctor when I was sick, I could have.

Maybe I am just becoming a silver-lining/glass half full kinda person (or have I always been? Hmmmm.. discuss later), but there are a lot of things that are kind of nice about this whole isolation thing.

Here in no particular order, are things I am enjoying about the COVID-19 stay-at-home orders:

• Books – I know, surprise, surprise, surprise. I like to read. And it’s fun to do when you are alone. Especially alone with a great cup of coffee two adorable rescue pups. Oh and the Library’s selection of digital books — because I need more books (</saracasm). Currently working on finishing The Dutch House by Ann Patchett, one of my favorite writers and I highly recommend. If you happen to be reading it too, let me know and we can virtual book club.
• Virtual Author Events – The good news here is that my happy place from my old hometown, Politics and Prose in Washington, DC, is now making all their author events virtual — so I can go to them! Some are free, and some you purchase an online ticket which typically includes the signed book as well. I GET A SIGNED COPY OF MADELINE ALBRIGHT’S NEW BOOK AND GET TO SEE HER SPEAK NEXT TUESDAY — and I can wear my pajamas and eat vegan mac n cheese at the same time.
• I’m Not the Only One Who Has No Idea What to Do: Turns out, no one really knows what they are doing. There is so much uncharted territory here, most people I have interacted with seem to have been giving people a little more slack — the expectation to be perfect has been lessened and it’s really nice.
• Do I Really Need That? Especially when it comes to food shopping and preparing meals, I am finding myself really simplifying. I am making an extra effort to use the food I have, and it has resulted in some wonderfully delicious meals. It’s also resulted in gaining about five lbs, but I also blame that on my being too sick to workout up until yesterday (see next item). I am also loving how reducing meat, egg, dairy consumption has gone mainstream, and people are learning how to make easy substitutions when these previously perceived staples are not available.
• Home Workouts with Friends – Today was my second day back working out, even if in a low-impact, moderate way. Trying my hardest to not push too much and am so thankful that both days I was able to join two of my favorite Orangetheory coaches and some studio-mates in virtual classes. Shout out to Orangetheory West Cary for putting this all together.
• Limited Hustle – I am not running around to all sorts of places and events and meetings before, during, and after work. In general, the pace has slowed and it’s awesome. I hope some of this stillness makes its way into life after the shutdowns.
• Lots of Time With Dogs! (this one needs no explaining)

Sammie and I after today’s workout. She helps on the hip bridges by standing on me.

• No Business Hugs – It is so nice to not have to negotiate this whole exchange anymore. I never liked business hugs, except with folks whom have become my friends and the relationship has been super established. It’s always awkward when someone, especially a guy, comes in for a hug and I put out my hand for the shake and he goes for the hug anyway.
• Therapy, Meditation, and Self-Care Are Cool! Seriously, do not hesitate to start therapy during this time and by all means continue it during. I feel like the past 20+ years of working on my self is really paying off, because goodness if I didn’t love and trust myself right now this whole experience would be a lot more painful. Big shout out to my therapists, coaches, and psychiatrists over the years. This mental stability is dedicated to you!

The nice weather here hasn’t hurt either. It’s been sunny, and we have been able to easily get out for walks without going any where near other people. I do miss swimming, and worry the pool won’t open this summer. There were ducks in it the other day which was kind of adorable. Funny thing is, I haven’t even been swimming regularly in a few years. When this clears, I will be sure to get myself back into the pool. Hold me too that.

My Best & Worst Moment of the Week

Let’s start with my worst moment, so I can bring you down and then raise you up and end on a high note. Like so many things in life, my worst moment started out as what I thought was going to be my best, everyone around me warned against what I was about to do, but I knew I was right. I was different. What happened to other people would never happen to me…

I went for a jog.

Everyone told me to wait three days after my symptoms had completely subsided, because if what I had was indeed COVID-19 it was taking people longer to recover than a usual flu and exercising too soon was bringing back symptoms. And the general wisdom about exercising when ill is if you are sick below the neck (okay, no comment here folks, this is serious), don’t exercise. So, if running nose — go run. If still have chest cough… DON’T EXERCISE.

But see, I am different. I am healthy. I did a freakin’ Ironman (yes, 4.5 years and 25 lbs ago). So, last Tuesday I did it. I went for a jog. Just two miles. And I even did jog five minutes, walk a minute… taking it easy. Until that second mile, because I felt GREAT so I jogged that whole second mile. It’s also important to always finish strong, so I picked it up a bit on the last little incline on the way home. My lungs felt great.

The next day, I was sore, and my cough was worse, but I told myself that was just the usual post “I-haven’t-exercised-in-almost-two-weeks-feeling-and-it-was-a-little-bit-cold-outside-so-of-course-my-lungs-and-chest-don’t-feel-too-great” workout reaction. Wednesday night I barely slept because was coughing much of the night and the night sweats had returned.

Good news – I am no where near as sick as I was 10-12 days ago. But, yeah, wasn’t my best idea.

I was determined today to finally write about some work stuff, since it was my first mostly-healthy week as Product Owner, and there was definitely some good stuff happening, and some big challenges being revealed. Unfortunately, I am pretty exhausted right now, brain is tired, and head starting to hurt a little.

Stay safe, stay home.

And here is some stuff that caught my eye this week (in case you missed me oversharing on Twitter):

• Abbott Launches 5-Minute Virus Test for Use Almost Anywhere
• One Root Cause of Pandemics Few People Think About – It’s our seemingly insatiable desire to eat meat
• Small Berkeley Business Retools Operations To Build PPE Face Shields For Hospitals (That’s my brother y’all)
• For Introverts, Quarantine Can Be a Liberation – The pandemic is also a time-out from our usual extrovert-dominated culture. We should make the best of that.
• Coronavirus: Out of Many, One – What Should the US Federal Government and the States Do to Fight the Coronavirus (“”…the quick takeaway is that more social distancing measures were better for the economy, no matter how you look at it.”)

I Don’t Feel Terrible

I hate phrases like that — like whenever someone tells me, “You’re not wrong” or “I don’t disagree with you.” But in this case, it really does work.

Today, I don’t feel terrible.

It was definitely a rough first week back at work, as all week I dealt with exhaustion, a cough, headache, night sweats, and overall icky feelings. On Wednesday, I used the AI/Text doctor tool my insurance company supports for a remote analysis and, as expected, the conclusion was, “Yeah, you might have COVID-19, you might have flu, you might have allergies, or a cold — doesn’t really matter, you can breathe and you aren’t delirious with fever so stay home.”

Sammie, Rona and Me on the Couch
Wednesday, March 25, 2020

I did, I have been, and I am. I started referring to my symptoms as Rona just to keep it fun. Thursday, which was day seven, I started to feel better, I even got up and showered and put in my contacts AND didn’t even have to take a nap in the middle of work. Unfortunately, Thursday night and Friday morning were not nearly as good, as day eight seemed to present me with a bit of a set-back. Had a couple of meetings, discussed Customer Journey Mapping with some folks, went through a few more backlog items, and then had to cancel the afternoon and sleep for three hours.

Fortunately, this morning I woke up feeling a whole lot better. I was able to sleep until 9 am (well, except for the 2 am, 3:30 am, 5:30 am wake up calls from my geriatric 17-year old pup, Teena Marie). Today’s victories include a.) putting away laundry, b.) zoom with friend in VA who also seems to have Rona visiting (she’s a PT who was forced to work onsite without PPE and see patients on March 13 — and one has since tested positive), and c.) bake chocolate chip cookies. I have also watched two episodes of Making the Cut and the latest RuPaul’s Drag Race. One of my season favorite’s went home — won’t say here, just in case you aren’t caught up yet.

I was feeling a burst of energy just as I sat down to write this, so was going to try and get back to the house painting after I finished… but just got hit by a fever spell and am feeling the energy sucked out of me again. Good news is, however, the cough is almost completely gone.

OH – and doing my part to help out small businesses. Ordered from Swagat Indian Cuisine tonight for delivery, because first, um, Indian food, and second, they are giving free food to unemployed folks in Morrisville. Also, donated to World Central Kitchen after watching Jimmy Fallon on his Tonight Show from Home interview Jose Andres and I was just reminded, once again, what a freakin’ wonderful person that man is.

So thankful for so many things today: my job, my friends, the internet, my jogs, Hungry Harvest produce delivery, Flyleaf Books (my order has shipped – $1 shipping until 4/1 y’all! New books on Monday — you know, because I have none), all the wonderful people delivering food to me via DoorDash, MY DOGS!, my family (check out my brother and his business partner making PPEs for ERs in the Bay Area), all the amazing people who work at the retirement community where my parents live (and are keeping them safe and in great spirits), the sunshine, great coffee, green tea, clean water to drink, Mrs. Meyers fun smelling soaps, and all the books. And Gossip Girl and The Great British Baking Show. And Trevor Noah. And of course, Dr. Fauci.

Not the Sunday Night I was Expecting

Tomorrow is my first day back as a Product Owner. After spending the past 2.5 years doing Customer Success work at CloudBees, and taking the past two weeks off, I am shifting over to be Product Owner for CloudBees Core/CI.

When I logged off on Friday, March 6 to start my break, I had already been planning on primarily having a staycation, spending the first week working on painting my home and the second week diving back into Scrum theory/study and Jenkins training to be all revving and ready to hit the ground running. I imagined that the Sunday night before I returned to work that I would be posting some bulleted list of the top five ideas I wanted to test out with the team.

I could still do that. I have been able to get some reading done, but as everyone knows A LOT has changed in the world since March 6. According to the World Health Organization Situation Report 46 that day, there were 98,192 confirmed cases of COVID-19 globally, and 3380 deaths. Today’s Situation Report 62 reports 292,142 confirmed cases and 12,784 deaths.

And this is absolutely under-reporting. Tests are absolutely unavailable. I have had symptoms since Friday, thankfully very mild in comparison to accounts that I have read, and based on the Coronovirus Self-Checker provided by the CDC, I am not even supposed to call my doctor at this point. Which is fine for me personally, I am fine, exhausted and have a cough and chest congestion, but no fever and no difficulty breathing. So please note, I am not complaining because of my individual situation. The worst thing that is likely to happen to me is that I won’t be showing up virtually to work all energized and ready to go as I had imagined.

But what is infuriating about this whole thing is that we, the United States, could have and SHOULD HAVE been prepared for this. It was not a surprise that it was coming. US intelligence reports warned Trump about this in JANUARY of this year. Even before that, in January 2017, Obama’s outgoing team presented exercises on various hypothetical scenarios to Trump’s team — and one of these was if the world faced a deadly virus and how the federal government should respond.

There is NO EXCUSE for the lack of tests. There is NO EXCUSE for the lack of protective medical gear for those amazing people who are working to actually remedy this situation and help people — states should not be competing against each other for equipment. It is well past the time for Trump to nationalize some of the supply chain to get the necessary medical equipment that will save lives. Despite what Trump says, this WILL NOT turn us into Venezuela. I don’t even care at this point if you all rich white dudes dump your stocks to these companies before you do this.

And see.. now I am exhausted and I won’t be writing an entry on my Product Owner values that I want to be sure to introduce and stick to (software not slides, team is the most important product, measure end user value, shorten and complete the feedback loop EVERYTIME, see.. I am still so scattered on this) I am hopeful these will be my only symptoms, and actually hope that I do have COVID-19 right now because I can sweat out these symptoms personally for another 10 days at home while I do my best to keep working — and I will keep getting paid, will keep buying things, and will not tax the health infrastructure. So, I guess given all that has happened since March 6, this night before the first day of my new Product Ownership role is still pretty darn good.

Time for another nap and some more tea.

Enemy of Good

Perfect is the enemy of good, right? That is what has been keeping me from writing again. I was all trying to be fancy and get my blog up and running on github via jekyll and all that, or do a for reals site again with my own fancy domain and get back into wordpress and CSS and such in depth.

And I was using that as an excuse, every single day, to not write. I was telling myself that no one in my field would respect me if I just threw up a cheap templated wordpress site (yep, just like this one)… but, with all the crazy shit (yep, I said it.. and life is too damn insane to worry about my language right now) going on right now I sat down today and threw out all that worry and TA DA. Here we go. My new blog.

I began a two week break from work on March 6. The purpose of the break was to clear my head and cure a bit of burnout before starting my huge new role as Product Owner for CloudBees Core/CI. And it started out perfectly. I bought paint to paint the downstairs of my house. I drove out to Charlotte to have brunch with my friend from college. This whole COVID-19 thing was in the news, and with my brother living in Italy it was definitely on my mind. But, for the most part I was planning on having a nice quiet two weeks, with the first one focused on my painting and the second on getting my head back into the Product Owner/CI/CD/CloudBees/Jenkins game. Part of that plan was to get a blog up and running so I could write a few times each week based on the independent study I am pushing myself through to improve my devops Product Ownership skills, and then lessons from my day-to-day.

But here we are.

Ten days later… 181,344 confirmed cases, 7,130 deaths. NYC bars and restaurants shut down. DC doing the same thing. Maryland, too. Idris Elba just posted he has it. I’ve stopped going anywhere I absolutely don’t have to go — which includes the gym. My head is beyond overloaded. The information changes constantly, and I am finding myself going back and forth between focusing on just how fortunate I am — as a middle-aged, healthy, remote tech-worker — and overwhelmed with worry for my brother in Italy, for my friend with cancer, for my friend with diabetes, for my parents (and all the residents in their retirement community), for my boyfriends’ parents, for the people who run my favorite places to eat, the coaches at my gym, the homeless, my pregnant friends, my barber, my PT, basically everyone who doesn’t have the luxury I do of being a salaried employee who could literally do her job without leaving her house.

I have so much to say, and yet I am at a loss for words. Make no mistake, Trump’s actions during this crisis (and more urgently, his INACTIONS) are killing people. He is taking no ownership of this at all – saying he doesn’t take responsibility for the lack of testing AND that he isn’t responsible at all for the disbanding of the White House Pandemic Office. Thousands, if not hundreds of thousands or possibly 1+ million people, will die because this jackass IS UNFIT TO BE IN OFFICE AND IS SO FULL OF HIMSELF HE CANNOT EVEN SEE THIS.

Obviously, I could write a whole post here about my thoughts on Trump and how his insanity is now literally destroying our world – kinda one of those just-when-you-thought-it-couldn’t-get-worse moments. But I have already hit my limit for news today, trying hard to limit the noise. And, honestly, if you are reading this, you likely share my opinion of the dipshit (do people still use that word? If not, we should, it works here), so you don’t need me wasting anymore pixels on him.

Wash your hands. Stay home. Don’t go anywhere unless you absolutely have to. Stay home if you are sick. Keep your distance from other people. Visit the CDC for more info. Oh, and for us healthy folks? This isn’t about us – it’s about slowing the spread and flattening the curve so when folks do get sick (it’s when, not if) it’s not so rapid as to shut down our medical system.

One of the other reasons I don’t write as frequently is that I always feel like I have to have the perfect ending to a post – where I wrap up all the questions and conundrums from the paragraphs above into a fun pithy statement that is useful, brief, and ideally a bit funny. Not gonna happen here.

But I do promise to you, and to myself, that I am going to put my head down tomorrow and start my Product Ownership studies and I WILL write a post synthesizing what I am learning. This will likely not interest you, but that’s okay. It’s what I need to do to keep my mind right through this all.