It’s hard to believe that I’ve been at Microsoft for almost a year now — and that I came down with COVID-19 six and a half months ago. When I look back at the tumultuous political landscape that is 2020, these two events will doubtless color my memories of this year in ways that I can not yet really understand.

The doctors told me that it takes six to eight weeks – on average – for healthy folks with my symptoms to recover. It took more than six months.

You gave up everything I’ve spent my life fighting for. I can’t imagine how much you must have been hurting inside to choose to do that.

• Sarah Novotny

It’s been a month now since I signed an employment contract with Microsoft.

You read that correctly — the giant tech company which I swore, back in the 90’s, I would never work for. Even though most of my colleagues have been very encouraging, even reminding me that Microsoft isn’t as monopolistic or walled-off as it once was, there are still some things which bear clarification (especially for any readers that have known me during the OpenStack or MySQL days).

(content warning: gender issues and gender-based violence, no specifics but still may be difficult for some)

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Yesterday, the Washington State Department of Licensing held a public hearing for comments on the proposed legislation to add an ‘X’ gender marker option on state-issued ID’s. I chose to go and stand up for all the non-binary, intersex, and transgender members of my communities.