What? The author was in the field for THIRTY-EIGHT YEARS!
Anyway, that's a potentially long time to be doing something you don't enjoy.
I've always enjoyed—and still enjoy—the technical aspects of programming.
Since this just came in my email….
"Working at $FIRM offers you the opportunity to work in a fast-paced, challenging, startup environment with a team of passionate individuals who love bringing ideas to life. At $FIRM, no role is small and every person plays a part in the development of our game-changing technology."
fast-paced = you won't have time to think to solve the problems better
challenging = no one knows how to behave themselves, least of all the founders
startup environment = so forget reasonable workweeks and having any time on weekends
team of passionate individuals = they don't have lives, either
no role is small = you will be assigned roles that the last person quit over because it was so trivial
That's the kind of thing I'm done with.
Hm, a rather cynical comment. It seems to me there are lots of highly enthusiastic participants on HN, and I'm blown away by how knowledgeable they are in many other fields as well--the sciences, culinary arts, music, sports....
It's quite a diverse crowd. It's safest to not generalize... ;)
I'm grateful for the opportunity to work from home, support my family comfortably, be in a field with lots of employment opportunities to fall back on, and be constantly learning new stuff.
Sorry it didn't work out for you, but it sounds like you found other interests to occupy you and (hopefully) support you, e.g. fantasy/scifi writing.