A Quick Introduction

Greetings.

I have these periodic urges to write things. Not because I'm really fascinating, or I think there is anything most people will find especially helpful. Because really, who cares what I think?

Well, aside from me.

I find that when I'm walking back to my apartment after work I sometimes think, "Hey, that was an especially insightful thought. I wish I could write that down for later reference."

Other times I think, "My family might be interested in knowing that. I should make note of it to tell them later." I then promptly forget to tell them about it later.

Sometimes I think it would simply be handy to have a kind of diary available online. Not with all the more sordid details of the more controversial things that go on in my head...no, I think the private journal will be the most best place for those thoughts (bwahaha!)

However, there are the things I wouldn't mind being more public about. It's an interesting line to dance; I used to work for a public school district, and while nothing was exactly completely banned as topics for public consumption, there was always this "cloud" hanging over employees. A cloud in which little knives flew around, humming, waiting for an opportunity to stab at you for revealing anything in a manner that wasn't professional, or whose content was deemed potentially offensive or controversial.

I hated that.

And those knives, for the most part, stayed whirling about in their little cloud. But when they sliced, they sliced hard and deep. I watched other people bear scars because they dared to utter something offhand on FaceBook that offended some parent or student, or had pictures appear online that had them in a less than professional light. Privacy settings changed, yet again, to cover new features or some configuration that was altered without knowledge...you know the drill. And in the end it always boiled down to, "Anything you put online, you should assume everyone can and will see it at some point."

In my view, this makes you less than human. After awhile, it seemed as though the school system turns every employee into dolls. They can't be human. Not a normal human, with an average life. They had to always portray themselves as representatives of the school; extensions of the school. You could never acknowledge that you have an opinion on anything. You can't acknowledge that you have actual preferences. You can't take a date to a bar or you risk having a student get a picture of you holding a glass of Bacardi in your hand. You can't give in to the urge to tell someone when they're a dumbass, even when you're out of the building. You had to constantly act as though the spotlight is on you, that you're constantly under scrutiny.

You can imagine this does wonders for your mental health.

I did have previous blogs online. I used another name; an attempt to separate myself from the content. I don't think I ever said anything that was actually controversial; I was simply afraid that when I shared a story of something not working right or a user doing something silly, even when I wasn't posting details, someone could possibly see it and assume I was talking about them and flip out. I simply didn't want to deal with that.

But like so many other people, I had an urge to share these stories, even if it was to an echo chamber. People are social beings. Even Aspergian minds like my own have the occasional desire to reach out and connect with other people at some level.

I stopped doing those semi-anonymous blogs awhile back. My life started changing, and they became less of a priority. After awhile, I lost all urge to keep them updated. So they sort of hang around out there, as if in virtual amber, a snapshot of a not to distant past version of me.

At this point, things have really changed.

My job has changed. My life routines have changed. Things in general have changed. A lot.

The urge to leave my brain droppings has been pecking away at my brain periodically.

That's when I decided to try my hand at this again. With my own profile this time; I feel that my current job isn't keeping me under a microscope so much as to require constant and pervasive self-censorship. To my knowledge I haven't offended my coworkers yet. Or if I have, they've not said anything.

"Silly brain," I thought. "What would this new blog be about?"

"Whatever you want to ramble about," it said.

"Then what would I call it? I don't feel like creating thirty blogs on thirty topics again."

"Then don't," my brain said. "Just make one about yourself and use those 'tag' thingies to separate your topics."

"But what would I call it? What would best encompass what I am now?"

The brain seemed to hesitate at that one for a bit. I never thought about how to best pigeonhole myself. "Since it's just about you...use your name as the blogger address," it said. "The name of the blog can always be changed later."

I decided to go for the alliterative title of "Sysadmin Surviving in the City." Because right now, that's largely what I am. I'd like to be a world famous author. I'd like to be a clever entrepreneur and programmer. I really want to be the world's best father and husband. But the thing that pays my bills and occupies the bulk of my thoughts is my job as a systems administrator while finding my way around the big city.

You have to understand I come from a very small town, so the city is very big and scary. I figure that title covers the major portion of my average day; my day job and my attempts to make sense of a place that has more people bustling around during the workday than the population of my home state.

The blog may even make a nice primer for people making the move from a sleepy rural town to a place where you're more likely to be hit by a car than accidentally shot by a hunter.

There it is. My intro to why I'm doing this. Bits and pieces of my life story will follow, I hope. If I'm lucky there will be the occasional brain dropping for you to step in, and hopefully they won't all stink. There's even a slight possibility that once in awhile I'll gain a follower or two. If not then I'll just have to make due with speaking to an echo chamber.

And that's okay too.