I’ve been struggling with something for a while now and ironically a sitcom from the 80’s finally helped me pinpoint the problem. My TV was on for background noise and I noticed that it was an episode of Family Ties. In the episode, Elyse Keaton was having a problem. A prominent building that she designed was being torn down and replaced by a cookie cutter mini-mall. She was struggling with her “legacy” - her mark on the world - disappearing. After the building was gone, what evidence would there be that Elyse Keaton was there?
I’m facing a similar issue. I don’t like getting into my day job too much online (for various reasons), but suffice it to say that applications that I developed for decades are being sunset/replaced. I’ve developed quite a lot over the decades, but eventually it would all be replaced. Once it is, what will I have as “proof that TechyDad was here”?
How do you handle the existential crisis of our works being digital and transient versus having an actual, physical product?
Well this topic is very subjective, but I’ll chime in…
“You have a right to perform your prescribed duties, but you are not entitled to the fruits of your actions.” -
Basically: You should be programming because you like programming - Not because you like that people like your program, or that it might immortalize yourself somehow - Or because people might use your program forever and will remember you by it
You can say the same for every profession: You’re the best doctor in the world and you healed millions of people. Great. 100 years later all those people are still dead anyways. What was the point?
Basically everything is temporary in the end, and everything is going to be forgotten. Seeing your job as a programmer as part of your identity and your applications as proof of your existence or digital legacy is pretty much pointless
Yeah, I think a big part of this might be a kind of mid life crisis. I’m not the “buy an expensive sports car” kind of guy, but I’m definitely the “worry that all you’ve done in your life was for nothing” sort of guy.
My wife crochets and I’ve got to admit to being jealous that she has a physical object when she’s done. I love programming. I love being able to take a big and complex problem, break it down, and construct an application that solves the issue. Still, at the end of the day, our works are 1’s and 0’s whose existence will be a lot shorter than my wife’s crocheted house elf.
It sounds like you don’t really have an outlet to create artsy or physical stuff, but as a programmer there’s plenty of stuff you can do…
For example, I’ve turned my entire house into a “Smart Home” - My house has smart lights that can be turned on be wifi, and my doors and rooms have motion censors that I’ve all programmed to work together, and turn things on an off when I’m walking around. You’re programming a bunch of physical IoT things to work together, and the end-result when everything runs smoothly is pretty cool
Also I recently got a 3d printer (where maintaining that is a hobby in of itself) - as a programmer you can create a lot of cool stuff with that. Like there are scripts to play with to generate a Sierpiński triangle[1][2] - work on that, physically print that, and see the results as a physical object.
As a programmer you have plenty of skills to start creating random physical stuff. Even if it’s not for your work, just pick it up as a hobby. Like I don’t think your wife is a professional crochetter - so what’s stopping you from crochetter or painting or sculpting or whatever
I do enjoy building LEGO. Not just the boxed sets, but I’ll get minifigures and then design and build biomes for them. After writing about my wife’s crochet, I realized that this is one reason why I enjoy this so much. I design a habitat for a LEGO minifigure using BrickLink Studio (a CAD program for LEGO)., I refine the build - both to improve it and to lower the cost of the build. Then, I order the parts and build it. (And then, I’ll often need to add additional parts to fix issues with the build that weren’t apparent until it was built.)
I’ll need to do some more of that building. Frankly, if I’m going to have a midlife crisis, it’s going to be a “build LEGO” midlife crisis and not a “buy a sports car” one.