Today I had the chance to "Zoom-in" to my alma mater today to give a presentation/workshop to the students in the Virginia Tech industrial design program. My focus was on "entrepreneurial design" — a presentation I have given many times before — I always enjoy spreading the gospel. It all went well, and it was a thrill to see two of my past professors holding court in the Zoom as well—they all seemed to look the same to me, except for the fact I'm almost 20 years past graduation.
Twenty years.
On the Zoom call one of my old professors brought up a project I made junior year when I decided that a "sponsored" studio was a corporate sell-out move by the school. Essentially I created a piece of satire—making fun of the project brief itself and taking the piss on the assignment—as well as embarrassing the professor, the dean, and the guest from the corporate sponsor. Honestly it was fairly unrigorous jackassery—I could have worked a lot harder to be the class smart-ass. As embarrassing as it was to hear him bring that up in front of a whole bunch of students (I was surprised he even remembered, I barely did) it did help me gain some perspective. I'm still a smart ass. I'm still prone to satire and sarcasm. But I hope I'm finding better ways to channel it now 20 years later.
Twenty years later.
That's a lot of years. I'm a totally different person from 20 years ago. Or maybe I'm not really. I've never been one to radically reinvent myself every few years. I didn't go to grad school. I didn't shift careers. I didn't uproot and move to a new city in my late 20s. I didn't fall into some strange hobby or find success in a new passion I had been kindling. I'm basically still the same person, albeit with layers upon layers of life painted on top. On one hand it feels underwhelming to think that in a world of seemingly infinite paths, I'm choosing to essentially stay on the one I have tread for 20 years. On the other hand, I like who I am, what I do, the life I live and the freedoms I'm privileged to have—so maybe my inadequate feelings are mostly rooted in some strange American obsession with the ability to change and uproot yourself a whim. Hard to say.
All I know is that 20 years feels like a significant amount of time—almost half my life. The past year of pandemic-life has been so incredibly sedentary-yet-stressful, it has almost distorted my sense of time completely. Was a year of slowness just what I needed to reflect on what I have? Was a year of pain and suffering enough to radicalize me to try to make more of a dent in the world? Will it take another 20 years to even know?
Twenty years.
On the Zoom call one of my old professors brought up a project I made junior year when I decided that a "sponsored" studio was a corporate sell-out move by the school. Essentially I created a piece of satire—making fun of the project brief itself and taking the piss on the assignment—as well as embarrassing the professor, the dean, and the guest from the corporate sponsor. Honestly it was fairly unrigorous jackassery—I could have worked a lot harder to be the class smart-ass. As embarrassing as it was to hear him bring that up in front of a whole bunch of students (I was surprised he even remembered, I barely did) it did help me gain some perspective. I'm still a smart ass. I'm still prone to satire and sarcasm. But I hope I'm finding better ways to channel it now 20 years later.
Twenty years later.
That's a lot of years. I'm a totally different person from 20 years ago. Or maybe I'm not really. I've never been one to radically reinvent myself every few years. I didn't go to grad school. I didn't shift careers. I didn't uproot and move to a new city in my late 20s. I didn't fall into some strange hobby or find success in a new passion I had been kindling. I'm basically still the same person, albeit with layers upon layers of life painted on top. On one hand it feels underwhelming to think that in a world of seemingly infinite paths, I'm choosing to essentially stay on the one I have tread for 20 years. On the other hand, I like who I am, what I do, the life I live and the freedoms I'm privileged to have—so maybe my inadequate feelings are mostly rooted in some strange American obsession with the ability to change and uproot yourself a whim. Hard to say.
All I know is that 20 years feels like a significant amount of time—almost half my life. The past year of pandemic-life has been so incredibly sedentary-yet-stressful, it has almost distorted my sense of time completely. Was a year of slowness just what I needed to reflect on what I have? Was a year of pain and suffering enough to radicalize me to try to make more of a dent in the world? Will it take another 20 years to even know?