00:00:25.150
I'm here to talk a little bit about love and code, and what happens when the romance goes off the rails. I'm not completely sure what that means, but at 3:41 AM on Wednesday, I received a Twitter message from Graham McBain, the organizer of this event. We should take a moment to thank Graham, Alyssa, and Zach for all their hard work in organizing this event. I know I wouldn't want to organize an event, and organizing can be a pain in the rear sometimes. So, before I start, I just want to say please forgive my A.D.D. The Twitter message said, 'Hey Mark, what are you up to Friday? Want to add a software talk for 20 minutes?' Since I wasn't in there, I wasn't sure what he wanted me to do at a software conference. But I messaged him back with my availability and my phone number, and here I am.
00:01:02.030
Graham and I met over a weekend at the CU Hackfest last spring, where I was a judge, just as unqualified to speak here today as I was then. You know how sometimes you meet someone, and they just have a good vibe? That's how I felt about Graham; he's interesting, and I wanted to spend more time with him. Hold on to that notion for the next 18 minutes. What came up in my picture is true: the only thing I know about Rails is what I read in my Encyclopedia Britannica last night. Does anyone even know what an Encyclopedia Britannica is?
00:01:36.680
Why am I here, and what does another straight white male with an ego, a microphone, and a story have to do with Rails? I grew up with Rails having a much different connotation among my peers. My name is Mark Gelband, and I know no less than one and zero about Ruby on Rails or any kind of coding. I remember when I first showed up at college, I had classes in BASIC and Fortran, and I was far more interested in poetry, partying, and satisfying my basic needs. Maslow's hierarchy shows that self-esteem and self-actualization were nowhere in my vocabulary.
00:02:06.300
Today, I am going to weave together three important stories: how I got here, the course of a love relationship, and why it matters. Also, how Rails, and more specifically, what each of you are doing with your coding skills and lives, can transform how we work, live, and become better versions of ourselves. Here goes, please be gentle. I got the call to speak 45 hours ago and have spent about 20 of those sleeping, so I will share more details personally later if you're interested.
00:02:36.760
I've done a lot of really cool things in my life, but I'm not sure if any of them amount to anything meaningful. It’s a bit disheartening to turn 50 and still feel that way. Two years ago, I was laid off from my safe and moderately fulfilling job, and I had just received a raise and promotion six weeks before that. This book in this picture contains the first hundred pages of correspondence I made with my wife, whom I met online. She created that for me, and I truly appreciate her being here with me today.
00:03:01.130
This book is filled with romance and represents that burning yearning feeling deep inside you. How many of you, when you were ten years old, thought, 'I definitely want to be a coder when I grow up?' And how many of you are currently doing the job you exactly want to be doing? Those of you with your hands raised are really lucky, and you should know it.
00:03:30.510
How many of you, left to your own devices, might do your best work from midnight until 3 AM or from 5 AM until noon? How many of you are really satisfied with what you're doing right now? I am speaking about this because it is really important to me. And how many of you work for a company that treats you like a grown-up, allowing you to show up when you want? If you do, you are really lucky.
00:04:05.110
Sorry about this; it's the first time I'm really doing this, and I just wrote it after getting fired. After I got fired, I focused on trying to finish building my family’s home–Boulder's first shipping container home. In some ways, it's more than a home; it's a vanity art project, reflecting the rich, white quality of life around me. I know I'm part of the problem, and I also know how relatively privileged I am–I think we all are if we are sitting here.
00:04:33.740
When I met my love, she was living in a cool church, filled with amazing art, projects, and collections. Now, I sometimes wonder how I can deal with all her stuff. Thank you for inspiration, for smiles, for everyday distraction, and for the new mantra: 'I will not let work or sleep get in the way.' That's something I wrote to Kourtney, and you know that feeling? It feels so good. It really meant something to me at the time.
00:05:01.570
I noticed that I had a lot of stuff when you met me, but it wasn't like it was false advertising from her perspective. I also have plenty of emotional baggage, but we all choose where we are in life. What happens after the illusion phase? What happens after the light in which we are seen disappears? You might think you have the ideal partner, but then the weight of expectations starts to show.
00:05:23.160
This happens at work, too. We have ping-pong tables, climbing walls, and catered lunches three times a week. Companies hire fresh junior coders and try to entice them with perks, but they expect them to meet constant deadlines and work long hours. This situation prompts a lot of questions about company cultures and respect for employees.
00:05:49.580
These are images from one of my favorite contemporary sculptors, Tom Puckey. His work is provocative and controversial. Yesterday, I faced a challenge from a woman I deeply respect regarding two images I had chosen for my talk. Puckey's work questions the objectification of women and cultural norms around power, weapons, war, and the body. The name of his latest show is 'armed and relatively dangerous,' and it embodies concepts that everyone in this audience needs to understand.
00:06:07.050
My son told me recently that I don't want to finish the house because I won't know what to do. He’s partially right. What I know is that I don’t want to work with people I don't like, trust, or respect anymore. I want my work to help make the world a better place for my grandchildren and your families. That's easier said than done, especially with mortgage payments and teenagers going to college.
00:06:41.180
In love, we begin to know our partners in a way where we can accept, communicate, and grow together. However, there's always the other side, where we can hurt each other deeply. I'd say in most relationships, both processes are happening simultaneously. This brings me back to all of you in this room; you have so much power. My friend Era, who's here, says that sometimes we coders carry AK-47s, and what we choose to do with that power tells the story.
00:07:10.410
This is a break because I just needed one. My father has been an old-time cigar smoker, and I have been fascinated by cigar culture and Cuban cigar factories. The reader that would sit on a stage and read stories or newspapers to factory workers was one of the most respected positions in the factory long before podcasts and deep house sets. The reader's job was to entertain and enrich the mundane workday.
00:07:35.770
Gerald Lachlan, one of my early writing teachers, said if you can answer 'yes' to three questions, you've probably written something worthwhile. I believe that if you can answer 'yes' to those questions about your coding, you’ve done something worthwhile as well. You always start with the first question, which is often the hardest. If you can answer 'yes' to the first two questions, it shows someone cares, even if it’s just your grandmother.
00:08:06.230
My motivations for building my house and creating meaningful work focus on family and need. My goal is to continue the process of love after romance, particularly with the most beautiful woman in the universe. This requires a rigorous self-examination and openness to criticism, growth, and change.
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I hope to inspire all of you to think about how you’re using your coding skills for the benefit of the world. Would you be interested in working in an environment that nurtures your whole self, or do you want to work at a company with employment practices that respect you as a person? Would that be a space you want to go to?
00:08:46.960
You have the power to create meaningful work. Do you want to use your power for the right reasons? You have written millions of lines of code and are on a path to being better people. Here I go, this is really the question: Do you want your power to go toward trivial things, or do you want to write code that transforms our world? That’s a real question we all need to grapple with.
00:09:14.820
I made a whimsical investment in Ello because I believe in elevated conversation, beautiful content, and data privacy. I realize that creatives and creative technologists hold the key to building the community I want to live in. I met Era from Dojo 4 about five months ago during Boulder’s startup week, and I am fascinated by the concept of creating purpose-driven work environments.
00:09:43.040
The real work of love happens after the romance fades. Sometimes we’ll need therapy, a bike ride, a Red Bull, or a joint just to get through tough moments. Recently, I went to Telluride to explore how these ideas might converge with some work done by the Telluride Foundation for its community. We are working on something we hope to share with the entire development community.
00:10:07.670
I was in a vulnerable situation while accompanying Era and his family on a car camping trip. We didn't know each other well but went with our instincts. My wife questioned my decision to tag along; we’re all kind of going with our gut when it comes to relationships, friendships, and possibilities.
00:10:36.880
Wandering into Dojo 4 might feel like an alien encounter for those used to a corporate atmosphere. They might see all the perks—ping-pong tables and climbing walls—and mistake that for a progressive corporate culture. But there’s something radically subversive happening in the small first-floor workspace in that Cinderblock building near Pearl Street. I invite everyone to stop by, as you'll find professionals who genuinely care about their work, their growth, and their communities.
00:11:03.590
Just saying this sounds like pie-in-the-sky thinking, but many companies only pay lip service to the idea of culture. Dojo 4 is fostering a perspective on place, people, practice, and purpose as the necessary processes for positive change. When I look at the house I am building, I feel pride in my achievements, but my love might see a list of unfinished tasks instead—deadlines unmet, a seven-year project that she wouldn't have signed up for if she had known what I know now.
00:11:32.140
That's rigorous truth: love after romance is all about pain, truth, and difficult work. The post-romance landscape is akin to the feeling of being tired of building for companies led by individuals who only care about their bottom lines. We all have a responsibility to engage with love after the romance and do the hard work necessary to move beyond the status quo.
00:12:02.830
I don’t have the complete answers—that's for sure. I'm just a guy here selfishly hoping to be a small catalyst for the positive change we want to see in the world. My kung fu teacher tells me to tidy up my life, and that's part of the process I'm committed to.
00:12:33.400
I want to thank my family for tolerating my flaws and my partner, Kourtney, for loving me enough to show me where I can improve. I also recognize that each of you holds incredible power—power you might not even realize you possess.
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I encourage you, challenge you even, to use that power to build things that matter. So, let's all strive for that together.