I enjoyed reading this. It could be because I'm thinking of doing more of system/network programming (and learning Zig). I've spent the last 6 years in the JavaScript land and bored of yet-another-bundling or SPA-like pattern.

So there's hope that with consistency and patience, one could build expertise in a totally different area

Thanks, it is inspiring, And it seems like I'm on the same way of that transition, Here is my individual expirment database for learning db internals and rust..

https://github.com/maxnilz/sboxdb

Now, trying to implement a rocksdb-like LSM based storage in modern C++ and call it from the sboxdb, just for refresh my old C++ memory.

> I was unhappy with this type-casting so I held out while unemployed and continued to write posts and host virtual hackweeks messing with Postgres and MySQL. I started the first incarnation of the Software Internals Book Club during this time, reading Designing Data Intensive Applications with 5-10 other developers in Bryant Park. During this time I also started the NYC Systems Coffee Club.

That's the spirit! And it worked.

If you can wrangle CSS, you can probably wrangle SQL pretty well.

Both are declarative ways of traversing graph-like datasets (DOM nodes vs tabular relations).

> I also wanted to cover what it's like coming from engineering management and founding companies to going back to being an individual contributor. (Spoiler: incredibly enjoyable.)

I've done the IC to engineering manager back to IC thing and it is indeed a huge relief to learn that it's OK to do that. My favorite piece of writing on that is The Engineer/Manager Pendulum by Charity Majors: https://charity.wtf/2017/05/11/the-engineer-manager-pendulum...

Charity makes a very convincing case that it's OK to swing from manager to IC and back again several times over the course of your career and that doing so will make you more effective at both of those things.