Skip to main content

Listening

Friday night I was very privileged to be able to hang out with my wife at her place of employment; it's a very cool, very forward-thinking place to be working and I'm extremely grateful that my wife gets to work there (not the least of which because it means that my night-terrors about being out of work aren't money-related). I've met a number of really nifty people who work there, but that night was special. That night, I was surrounded.

Specifically, I was surrounded by enormously talented, confident, intelligent women who work in development, engineering, and operations. It was not exactly brand-new to me; I've taken to trailing along to PyLadies with my partner and it's where I met some really fantastic people I'm very happy to know. But this was an environment where everyone knew one another; everyone was relaxed and open and laughing and having a good time and talking about nerdy stuff and the energy was just fantastic.

I tried very hard to be quiet. As a man, especially as a white man in IT, my voice is basically the default one; it's the voice that comes out of most of the CEOs and CTOs and CFOs and the rest of the alphabet-soup-level people not to mention most of the Dev and Ops people. So when I found myself in a situation where my voice wasn't the default, I tried very hard to listen more than I spoke.

I had a great time, but I was reminded again that there are amazing people here in Portland and amazing companies here in Portland and I want to be a part of that amazing stuff. And that listening is a skill that I need to work on.

Labels

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

#RPGaDay 2017 -- Day 12

Which RPG has the most inspiring interior art? This is another one of those 'define your term' questions, because inspiring to whom? Inspiring to what? Are we talking about me wanting to build a cool-looking character? Then I'm not sure anyone can beat Paizo's Pathfinder work, or the 4E core rulebook art. Inspiring to really get into the tone of the game itself? Then the particular aesthetic of the powered-by-the-Apocalypse games (notably No Rest For The Wicked , Dungeon World , and the core Apocalypse World book) are on-point for that, as is the incredible Flat Pack and Maschine Zeit . Inspiring to me as a player about the experience of playing RPGs? Then Fate 's core rulebook, with the gamers of colour and the disabled gamers is really inspiring to my heart about the hobby, as well as Breakfast Cult . What about you? What are you inspired by?
Post a Comment
Read more

#RPGaDay 2018 Day 19: What music enhances your game?

Again, this really depends on the game and whether or not I'm playing or running or what have you. The RIFTS game I just storyran leaned heavily on Tell That Devil by Jill Andrews and Neko Case's Hold On, Hold On  for mood and setting. Sometimes, I think about themes for my characters. I had a dwarven knight that used to ride around humming Shostakovich's 5th . And there's a good chance that my newest character will hum chiptunes to themselves, since they're a robot.
Post a Comment
Read more

#RPGaDay 2017 -- Day 18

Which RPG have you played the most in your life? If you count all the editions of D&D as one RPG, then the answer is D&D. I never was serious about 1st or 2nd Ed., but I was part of a 3E playtest group, and I started a 4E campaign basically as soon as I could. If you don't count all of the D&D editions as one, then the answer is HERO system, specifically Champions 4th Ed, the Big Blue Book. I was part of a group that played with the BBB for quite a while, through two multi-year campaigns. I have to admit, there is something rather satisfying about chucking great fistfuls of d6s across the battlemat and being able to figure out the body damage basically instantly. After that, I think it's GURPS, and then after that would be Pathfinder, and then 4E. I've dabbled so much with so many systems that the long-term campaigns basically swamp everything else.
Post a Comment
Read more