Today is a day of ends.
Not big ends, all small stuff, but the sum of which feels impactful as timing found the ends all lining up to the same day.
It's the end of my work year, with much less accomplished than I'd hoped, and much more gained in terms of responsibility than I'd expected.
I continue to see my job shift from "programmer" to general problem-solver (programming still being the primary tool for this purpose). I see myself struggling in the coming years to stay relevant at programming if my work continues to pull me into higher level discussions and meetings. I fear there will come a time that I'll be so involved discussing problems and solutions that I'll not be able to find time to keep my skills polished enough implement these solutions myself. That time won't be 2023, however, so for now I forge ahead.
I've just reached the end of my most recent Audiobook: "The Lost Metal", which coincidentally is the end of "Era 2" of the Mistborn series. This is a series I've been following for a long time, and while I was initially unsure of the Era 2 cast, I've found Sanderson's writing in this era to feel a bit less "Young Adult" than the first Era of Mistborn.
Sanderson's works are very much comfort food for me, especially when it's Michael Kramer doing the reading -- I've been listening to him voicing fantasy novels back to the very first audiobooks I ever listened to (Wheel of Time). I don't have much to say on the book except that I liked it quite a bit, and enjoyed the endings he gave to his characters in this Era.
I've also just finished volume 10 of Sandman, which as a series I simultaneously liked less, and appreciated more than I'd expected. I found a lot of the storylines in the series to be left incomplete, but Neil Gaiman's blurb at the end of volume 10 put the entire series into perspective for me: "In many ways that's what these stories were about: the process of saying goodbye."
With that single sentence everything kind of fit into place, and I was able to put a name to the melancholy running through the entire series. Honestly I don't know how I missed it before, but in that context I feel stories can be left with unsatisfactory resolutions -- many goodbyes are.
The series is very artsy -- that's not a complaint, but it was artsier than I'd expected. The series reads more like literature than most comic books, and can be difficult to follow at times. I wasn't overly fond of the short-story collections that generally comprised every other volume. I found while these helped for a bit of world building, many of them didn't add much to the overall narrative (which I was more interested in).
I've still got volume 11 to read, though volume 10 is the end of the main storyline. I think I'll take volume 11 slowly and continue with what's been a little bit of a tradition and read it in bed as I fall asleep. What better way to read "Sandman" than passing out and letting the story bleed into your dreams?
I've accepted the decision to move next year, which is a kind of end, and something I hate doing. I tend to grow very attached to both places and living patterns. Me and my partner moved to a smaller city during COVID where we could afford a house, but with things opening back up it would be cruel to keep them (who doesn't drive) in place where driving is essentially mandatory to accomplish even the most basic activities.
So it'll be back to the big city, which will require me to live a little less comfortably as I'll need to find a functioning commuting and dog-watching pattern in the new configuration. As much as I dislike the idea, I do appreciate having someone to push me into changing things up semi-regularly, as alone I'd likely stagnate in one place forever.
Bit of a tangential end, but I found out they're retiring Ash and Pikachu, anf the news hit me way harder than expected. I haven't kept up with the animated series in many years, and think it was likely time to move on or let Ash grow up long ago; but the announcement that "this will be their final journey" really choked me up.
As a kid I was religiously into the Pokemon TV show, and to this day one scene is stuck in my head at the very end of the first season. In my head the scene is ash standing there after losing in championship as the full version of the "Gotta Catch 'em All" song plays out -- but I went and re-watched it and it was definitely more of a montage-of-the-journey-so-far scene. The effect was the same; at 9 or 10 years old I was devastated by the idea that Ash lost at the end of the series. It was incomprehensible to end my favorite show this way! In the end, however, he was ready to get back up and train harder and try again, which was a super foundational storyline for young me.
Anyways, they're retiring Ash and something in my brain is sad about it, even though I haven't cared about Ash for over a decade.
So here I am -- between books and audiobooks and games. The end of my year came 2 weeks early and now I'm in a bit of a limbo -- but I kinda dig it. I've got 2 weeks of limbo where I'm going to just futz with projects and play some undemanding roguelikes and read short stories. Not get into anything too heavy. Start the new year with a clean slate, and try to find a good balance next year between entertainment and education in my selected readings and playings.
A day of small endings, but all good endings. I feel very inspired to start new things in the new year.