I’ve been having a pretty crap year so far, for so many reasons. It’s been basically, every week, Fate stops by to kick me in the shins. It’s been dragging me down a lot and I’ve been pretty unhappy. And sometimes I’d get up in the morning and look at my Twitter feed, and people would be posting, oh, the such-and-such museum has blah-de-blah exhibit free today!, and I’d sigh, and think, I wish I could go there and see that, I’ve been meaning to go there for so long and just haven’t gotten around to it… I was just so burnt out and tired of watching everything go by, and tired of the endless streams of maybe next week or maybe next month…. Not to be clichéd but really, it has felt like so much is just passing me by. I mean, I swear I was only 25 last week, so what have I managed to do with all these years going by?

So, despite the fact that this is zomg the recession!!!!!11!!!!!!1!!1!!! and all, I went to my boss and said “Hey, I’m kind of burnt out, and I think I’m going to leave, so let’s figure out an exit strategy.” And that’s what we did. I wound up giving three weeks’ notice, and basically puttered around the office answering questions and emailing people inane “oh here’s an idea I had to solve that one problem” (because of course I didn’t want to go committing changes to scripts that I wouldn’t be around to fix if I blew them up) and cleaning out my office a little bit each day, until today, my last day, I finished packing up, gave and got some hugs, and left the office for the last time.

(I then arrived home and promptly realized I’d left something at work in the fridge — some paneer a friend bought from an Indian grocery for me, that I was going to cook with tonight. Balls.)

I’m a little sad now, because after all I’d been there almost 4 years and had a lot of friends, and I understood the complicated, automated linux infrastructure because I was there to start designing it and worked with everyone as we gradually brought more people on staff — and it’s hard to let go of something that you feel like is your baby, like that. But I’m really looking forward to my summer vacation. I don’t really have any great plans; at least, nothing greater than “learn to run 5k by August,” as I signed up for an 5k run in Grant Park. I want to get up in the morning and read my Twitter feed and when I see such-and-such museum has blah-de-blah for free today!, I want to grab my CTA pass and go see it. I want to go lie around in the sunshine in Grant Park like a big lazy slacker college student on summer vacation. That’s about the sum total of my grand ambitions. Well, that, and I want to unwind a little, because seriously, 2010? You are stressing me out like whoa. So, I am now officially unemployed, for the first time since I was eligible to start working at 16. Which is 16 years, incidentally. I think I earned summer vacation.

But right now? I have friends texting me, and I have to go pop on the L and go up to the north side and drink beer while sitting on a patio in the sunshine. The weather’s supposed to get cold tomorrow, and I’ve got to take advantage while I can. And that’s just what I’m going to do.