The Internet Still Amazes Me

It's been a while since I last wrote, yet I've had three random encounters with my blog in the past few months.  Each has left me a little weirded out (random people are reading my writing?), but mostly just excited that someone else has taken interest in my perspective despite no attempt to publicize my writing or even write regularly. First, a woman emailed me asking if there was ever an end to the sciatica pain I started experiencing in the summer of 2011 and wrote about here.  In short, there is hope for it to lesson, although more than 2 years after I wrote that I am still experiencing pain.  Oddly, running my first ever marathon is what reduced the pain for me most (still can't explain that one).  Then, someone asked if I would sell them a print of the Zakim Bridge photo that I took in Boston a few years back.  I was flattered, and ended up sending the photo in exchange for them making a small donation to the charity of their choice.  I still think that is one of the coolest photos I've seen of that bridge, and it looks pretty great printed on canvas above our bed.  Today, I exchanged a few tweets with a developer here in San Francisco that is struggling with the same thing I have been:  Is it better to specialize or generalize?  I've decided to not go for a dev or design bootcamp and instead continue looking for a product manager or technical project manager position in an industry I'm passionate about.  I enjoy all the elements of building products (whether it's design, leading others, getting into the details, planning, or executing) too much to focus on just one area.  I know that when I do find the right role for me (and I am crushing it there) I will share some good laughs with my boss about any hesitation they had in hiring me.

This all brings me back to how much the internet still amazes me to this day.  It makes it so easy to connect with random strangers around a shared idea, struggle, or photo by just putting a few words up on a blog or writing a 140 character Tweet.  The transparency that more and more companies are now embracing (see the Buffer "open salary formula") is  becoming the standard way that young and innovative companies are doing business.  I love it - sharing what you have learned or struggled with in order to help others is a beautiful thing.