Comment by MichaelCrawford | Hacker News Reader

Comment by MichaelCrawford | Hacker News Reader

MichaelCrawford

When I resigned in protest from amcc i wrote "When i lay on my deathbed looking back on a lufe well-lived, I am not going to wish I had shipped more product."

While not dead certain I may have just found a woman who wanted to marry me in 1985, but her grandmother did not approve of me.

I miss her so. Im going to write her soon, if its her I will go visit but now she is far too old to bear my child.

Several times I have been kissed by beautiful women who made it plain they were mine for the asking but each time I pursued the impossible dream.

My ex did not want to have children. I know why but cannot tell you. Deciding to be with her was one of the most difficult decisions of my life. Now i feel I chose wrong.

Hey Anne whatever happened to Cheryl, she was one of our vendors back in the day.

She died of some very rare cancer. I am completely convinced thats because I did not kiss her back. Not that I was not interested but that i was painfully shy then.

He who hesitates does not get To swim in the gene pool.

Ive written lots of code ive made lots of money. nsome of my products were huge hits.

Consider homer's illiad and odyssey. what code that any of us write will last that long.

It is a rare person who learns from the mistakes of others. I think your words will resonate quite well with those who have lived and loved and lost. They may fall on the deaf ears of the young.

The choices you made were the ones that were right for you when you made them. When you are young and the future seems full of promise, you simply take each experience as one in a sequence leading you to the success you imagine is waiting for you at the end of the road. Whether it is success in love or business. That's the beauty of youth: optimism, uncorrected by reality.

I look at my daughters' faces every day as I carry them around. I see their optimism for what life will bring. There is something special in that look. When do we lose that?

Lastly, I did not want children in my life until, suddenly, I did. Had I continued to wait, I might have missed my opportunity without even knowing it. But then, it would have been the right decision for me at that time.

I suppose you already know this but poetry is not to be taken too seriously. They are far removed (three times) from the truth. This is what Socrates says about them [1]

"I do not mind telling you in confidence that all poetry is an outrage on the understanding, unless the hearers have that balm of knowledge which heals error."

"All poetical imitations are ruinous to the understanding of the hearers, and that the knowledge of their true nature is the only antidote to them"

"Imitation, then, is devoid of knowledge, being only a kind of play or sport, and the tragic and epic poets are imitators in the highest degree."

I'm not saying one shouldn’t enjoy poetry. But like most other literature, in general, they should only offer a perspective. A different point of view. Nothing more. A true poem, as Socrates says, is a lyric of the soul. Something that lifts the fallen spirit and gives hope in defeat.

Romanticism is certainly tender and is good for softening a coarse exterior. But in the end it is just entertainment.

[1]http://www.gutenberg.org/files/1497/1497-h/1497-h.htm#link2H...

This is a great reminder that there are things we need to let go of and not let them bother us for the rest of our lives. Whatever decisions we regret, we should remember that they seemed like good ideas at the time. Hindsight isn't always 20/20; sometimes it is really, really distorted.

>Consider homer's illiad and odyssey. what code that any of us write will last that long.

Not to be pedantic but that's really a non-sequitur. You can't compare literature/story telling to technology on the same impact metrics.

If only i could give a zillion upvotes!

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