Site icon Mel Choyce

2022 Recap

This recap is late, but that about sums up 2022. It was a quiet year for me, and I mostly kept my head down due to lack of energy. 2022 felt more like a slog than previous pandemic years—whether because we’ve settled into this uneasy “let’s just pretend there isn’t a pandemic still happening” funk or what, I’m not sure, but it always feels weird to be one of the only people still masking inside.

Work

With a new job, I’ve had to work a lot on resetting my routines. I have much less time now, and spend a lot of my work day in meetings—much more than I had in the past, which has taken a great deal of time to get used to. I think it’s one of the many things fueling my low-level exhaustion, since I find video meetings especially tiring.

But I have settled, and for all I have too many meetings, I like my new job a lot. I’m working on projects focused on improving public services, and learning a lot from my fantastic coworkers. One of my biggest fears leaving a8c was leaving behind so many amazing colleagues, but my coworkers at 18F are just as kind, hard working, and caring.

I have a strong sense of responsibility for my work that I think was a natural progression from working on a huge open source project, to working on projects that impact huge swaths of America. I haven’t necessarily done anything super impactful yet, but even the small stuff feels like it can make a difference. I’ve always had a strong sense of civic duty, and this has only grown at 18F.

I’m likely going to be wrapping up the project I’ve been on since mid-year in the next few months, which is exciting—hopefully that project will launch later this year, and I can talk about it more. I’m also stoked to work on something new soon.

WordPress

I did such little contributing this year, which was frankly weird. I didn’t receive props for my first release since I started contributing over a decade ago. I miss it a lot, but it’s hard to muster up the energy to contribute after work and on the weekends.

I’d really love to do more work with patterns and block themes. I have some ideas for an updated WordCamp theme using full site editing, I just need to make the effort to sit down and try out some ideas to propose to the community.

I did have a chance to make it to WordCamp Montclair in NJ this summer, and spoke on designing with block patterns:

It was amazing to see community folks in person again, and I’m already excited for the next one this year.

Life Updates

The most exciting thing that happened in 2023: we adopted a new dog! Meet Noodle:

He’s a ~1 year old jindo mix from Korean K9 Rescue and he has been an amazing addition to our family. He’s curious, playful, and gets along with everyone. He’s also been a good influence on our other dog, Lemon, and is helping her come out of her shell a little bit more.

Also in life changes this past year, I finally got an (adult) diagnosis for ADHD, something I was diagnosed with as a kid and never treated for because I could, quote, make eye contact? And didn’t need it? Despite almost failing out of middle school? After 34 goddamn years on this Earth I am finally taking some meds for it, and I’ve noticed an improvement in my overall focus, concentration, and ability to actually start tasks. It’s not drastic by any means, but I’ll take what I can get. Looking forward to seeing how that evolves over the next year and trying not to mourn what could have been.

Hobbies

I’ve been doing some drawing and writing this past year, but mostly I’ve focused on improving my music skills. In addition to my regular music lessons, I participate in a weekly challenges on a music theory discord I’m in, which has been great for keeping me practicing.

Here’s some originals from the past year:

And some rearrangements/remixes:

I’ve also played an ungodly amount of Horizon: Forbidden West. Will that change in 2023? Probably not. (Though I have started playing The Last of Us, thanks to the new show!)

Onward!

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