New Year, New Career
New decade, new tech aid. I don’t know, I just wanted to make a rhyme.
As the holidays wrap up and I get back to work on my project for Lambda School, I’ve been doing some retrospection. The past decade, for me, has been really intense.
I started it out as an incredibly unemployable boy. I was 22, I had recently gotten into some trouble with the law due to a disease of mine, I had lost my brother to that same disease, and really had no reason why I should still be alive instead of sharing his fate. I had never obtained a driver’s license, barely knew what responsibility was, and couldn’t remember a time that I wasn’t using drugs. I was on probation, needed a job, needed to stay clean, and needed to contribute to society. I had absolutely no direction.
It’s a pretty long story of triumphs and failures, that will probably turn into several other posts, but suffice to say I bounced around until I grew up.
Now, I have a license, a car, a husband, a dog, a house, multiple jobs, a bachelor’s degree (with top honors), relationships with family, friends, direction, purpose, passion, serenity, and have been clean for many years.
The weirdest thing is that these things actually came quite easily after a certain point. See, I think I needed that terrible tragedy and strife to learn the hard lessons early. I needed to be beaten down to the point that I was certain that I was destined to be a poor drug addict for the rest of my life, which would probably be very short, in order to conquer my fear and change for once.
I learned a lot this decade, and this past year, I walked through some very tough times. I also asked my husband to once again sacrifice so that I could do some schooling so that I can finally help us to achieve a better station in life. He graciously supported my decision to pursue Lambda School and I think I has been one of the best decisions that I’ve made in the past decade.
My cohort of UX9 just finished our 3rd unit which focused on High-Fidelity design and now we move into HTML and CSS. I’m more than a little excited about the work that I have produced thus far in only 3 short months, as well as the work I’m going to accomplish this coming month. I feel like I’m learning the skills needed quickly, yet thoroughly enough to be confident in applying for a real User Experience Design job soon.
It’s difficult to properly express what that actually means to someone like me.
Ever since I was very young, instead of dreaming of being some big star or celebrity, I dreamt of being comfortable. I dreamt of a reasonable house, a husband, a dog, and not having to worry about every cent that I spent. I dreamt of seeing something novel or a new piece of clothing that I liked, and being able to purchase it without having to worry about if I will still be able to afford groceries. I dreamt of not having to shop at the thrift store. I dreamt of being accepted by others. I dreamt of being able to help out my mom or sister if they needed it. I dreamt of not being afraid of going to the doctor due to the bill that would come.
Thank you, Lambda, for helping me feel like my dream is finally within my grasp.
