THE STORY
You know how a quarter-life crisis hits you? No? Let me explain then.
A quarter-life crisis occurs at the age of 25 for a female with depression, anxiety and chronic imposter syndrome. Generally, said subject is highly qualified and intelligent, but with severe mental health issues that are exacerbated by a climate change crisis, an unstable global economy and black tax. Nothing out of the ordinary, really.
All right, now that we are well acquainted, let me get to the point of Pandalilly. It is as a consequence of this period that I decided I wanted to live life on my own terms. Admittedly, this period is still in progress. Daily, I remind myself that I have decided to do things how I see fit and daily, I fight the urge to give up. That is why Pandalilly exists. What is most motivating, is sitting in front of a computer, programming, and generally mucking around the internet. That is part of living life on my own terms. As such, Pandalilly is a collection of projects that I will undertake to make myself feel happy and satisfied.
I am hoping that daily, I see a purpose in pursuing ideas, concepts and projects for the fun of it. At the moment, I am working on honing my software development skills. For now, these are the kinds of projects that will form the initial collection for Pandalilly.
Actually, now that memory serves me well, the first Pandalilly project started when I bought a Raspberry Pi in order to apply for jobs. I was unemployed for a moment in 2020 (about 5 weeks) and had given in my work laptop, had given away my laptop to a family member who was now studying at university, and left only with my smartphone. Not ideal for applying for jobs. So naturally, I looked into low-cost solutions.
Back at university, I had been introduced to the concept of single-board computers, and that Arduino and Raspberry Pis were such examples, with benefits of being cost-effective. After, some research I bought a kit for R1300 (incl. delivery). And that kit, for the next two months, served as my desktop computer. On my Pi, I applied for jobs, watched YouTube videos and even learnt the basics of programming in Python.
This sparked a joy I could not fathom. I realized that I loved learning, but most importantly, I LOVE programming. It combines creativity and systematic logic, layered on computer science principles. (And it’s about system design. System. That word alone, brings me peace). The joy of executing a little script and it works, is unmatched in my opinion.
I had flashbacks to my high school years, sitting in front of a CRT screen and coding IT projects in Delphi (programming language). Although I was not allowed internet access, I found ways to entertain myself on my computer. I partitioned my hard drive, defragged it (it’s a Windows thing), installed all kinds of things and mucked around the Windows filesystem, often to my demise. There were one or two times where I accidentally deleted everything, but that was fine. I just had to start a couple of school projects from scratch. The same thing did not happen with my Pi… except that one time…
My Pi made me realize that I love computers, learning about how they work and how to talk to them. This is most fascinating to me. And so, I decided to channel all this energy into a personal project. I’m currently learning JavaScript, functional programming techniques and Haskell. Oh, and Linux system admin things. It’s a lot but I’m getting closer and closer everyday to building something I can integrate into my life for fun. But I have to start here first.
Come along and see what else Pandalilly is going to be about. Because, I love writing, poetry and photography. Get ready for some mediocre but highly joyful art (for me). And perhaps, even more mediocre code. Mediocrity is as mediocrity does. But you gotta try… just in case;