What I’m Thankful For: 2020 Edition

My parents loathe when I use poor language but luckily they don't read this blog so I'll just be blunt: 2020 has been an absolute shit show. COVID-19 has been a world-wide source of devastation to lives, jobs, and our quality of life. That said, I've found myself feeling incredibly grateful at the end. Despite the pains of 2020, I'd like to share those thoughts.

Mozilla

I was laid off by Mozilla this August, so I should be really annoyed with them, but it's 2020 so what the hell, everything is backward. The truth is that I met lifelong friends at Mozilla, was able to code projects that have reached hundreds of millions of users, and was able to travel to faraway lands I could have only hoped to have as a child. I was well compensated and "David from Mozilla" really helped propel my professional career. Again, I am still annoyed with Mozilla, but moving on feels great because...

MetaMask

...MetaMask has given me an amazing opportunity to let me break into cryptocurrency as an engineer. Readers of this blog and my obnoxious Twitter account know that I'm hugely excited about cryptocurrency, and MetaMask's status as the best crypto wallet provides me an amazing opportunity to touch millions of lives. My new MetaMask family is incredibly talented, caring, and ambitious. I couldn't be in a better place and I'm ready to do everything I can to propel the project forward in every way possible.

Family

When life get incredibly difficult, you learn what's important to you and who your friends are. My wife and sons went through it all this year. COVID-19 derailed their schooling and my wife's profession; it was difficult. My amazing wife adapted to becoming stay-at-home-temporary-teacher and my children learned remote learning life. I was then heartbroken as I dropped my youngest off to his first school experience in a mask, but they've been so resilient and I'm so proud of them. We're so lucky to have each other!

Todd Gardner, Track JS, and Request Metrics

Todd has been an amazing co-host of the Script & Style podcast. Having a friend to chat with makes podcasting so much fun, and is a driver of improvement. The support of Todd's excellent services, TrackJS for error monitoring, and Request Metrics for performance monitoring, make the commitment to helping all of you that much sweeter.

YOU!

One of my favorite memories from 15 years ago was my (future) wife introducing me to her mother, saying "and his blog had 150 visitors today." Listen, I'm not much to look at, so I'll take what I can get. The truth is that in a year of professional change and COVID-19 strife, the normalcy that writing this blog provided me was exactly what I needed. And sometimes clinging to that normalcy is what keeps us going. Whether it was 150 visitors then, or the millions of visitors now: THANK YOU.