It’s time to be introspective. To consider the year just ended and the year ahead. I’m not introspective enough but am when I write which is one of the reasons I enjoy writing. The photo is from my family’s annual Tex-Mex outing over the holidays.

I worked at a new company in 2023, I started on Halloween 2022. TierPoint is my 3rd or 4th employer since I entered the tech field in 1990. I say 3 or 4 because my last employer was actually my second in terms of acquisitions. I went from an internship with IBM to being a data network design engineer at US West, to working 23 years at IBM, then back to US West, but they were now called CenturyLink and changed their name to Lumen while I was there, to now TierPoint – a cloud/hosting company that owns about 40 data centers in the US. Essentially: IBM – Telco – IBM – Telco – Cloud. I can see myself working another seven years or so. I’d like to work at a small startup before I retire.

I accomplished 3 things in 2023 that stand out to me. I learned my new job. I drafted about 25,000 words in a new novel. And I finally got back in shape, taking 2nd place for my age in the Boulder Marathon in October.

I did some other things. Not sure they are important but I want to capture them. I’ve been retreating from social media. I can’t really explain why, I sense it’s more emotional than rational. I killed my Twitter, Pinterest and Instagram accounts. I paused and have now deleted my Facebook account. And I’m blogging less. I even experimented with taking this blog private for a day but determined it would be too onerous to admin private accounts for my followers. 

The novelty of social media has worn off and for whatever reason, and despite always being very comfortable with my online presence, I’m feeling over-exposed. I need to accept it if I want to market my novels but I’ll worry about that the next time I publish one. I’ll keep my LinkedIn active for as long as I’m working, but otherwise, I’m trending towards exclusivity. You’re gonna have to know me to be my friend.

My focus in 2024 will build on my 2023 accomplishments. My job requires intensive knowledge-building. I can’t tell you how many generative AI books I’ve read this year. Well actually, I probably can. That reminds me, I need to consider killing my GoodReads account. I’ll probably keep it though since it’s aligned with being an author.

I haven’t given up my plans to run a 100K ultra. This broken collarbone is a real hurdle but it gives me focus. I signed up for a 50K ultra in April as a goal. That’s a bit of a stretch as it appears I won’t be running again for another month, but the important thing is I have a race on my calendar. I deferred my Bandera 100K out to January 2025.

And then, there’s my novel. With focus, I’ll complete that this year. It’s been a lot of fun researching the Texas Hill Country which is the setting for the story. The research never ends when you’re writing but I do feel that I’m past most of that phase now. Time to focus on character building and the story line.

Lastly, I’m ending this year with Covid. That feels like an accomplishment because it’s my first time. Both the broken bone and Covid are firsts for me, so definitely accomplishments. I’m miserable though. Nothing worse than a man with a bad cold plus a broken bone. It’ll make starting 2024 out healthy feel like that much more of a fresh start though. Can’t wait.