Why am I here? Why do I deserve to exist?

Yes, I’m one of those young guys—now not so young, as I watch the last grains swirl through the hourglass of my thirties—who’s always been given to asking these questions. You know those guys, the ones to whom people give Rainer Maria Rilke quotes on cards for high school graduation. It’s all kind of tedious—but fine, so be it. Aspire to the words of Chuck D: One in one million residents/Be a dissident/Who ain’t kissin’ it.

Professional I’ve tried to translate my hierarchy of values like this:

• I want to be a good man (to lead a just, meaningful, and useful life)
• …by helping others
• …by unblocking the light of their creativity & expressiveness
• …by building software they love.

Now, though, that’s at best what my lawyer friends might call “necessary but not sufficient.” I catch myself wandering far out on the leaves of that tree, far from the trunk, wondering why I don’t get closer to the action of being good & helping others.

None of this is new to me. Three years ago, for example, I spent a little time in a Guatemalan orphanage, hoping to help others a bit and at least improve myself, deepening my perspective and gratitude. But damn if it all isn’t some abortive feint—some vanity inoculation against the sense of having to do anything material. Back I come into my regular world, which takes hold, submerges me… Never again is what you swore the time before.

But not this time, mofo (I say to the mirror). Not this time. I am not going to blow my life.

The search is on.