> moved to a team working on low level networking software for high performance computing.

> I don't know why data sometimes has to be aligned to cache lines or what cache lines even are.

> I try to learn these things in my spare time but it's a real struggle.

Well the good news is you don't need to learn this in your spare time, because it's your job, so you can learn it on the clock?

Take a look at Inside the Machine [1] to get an in-depth, but accessible, understanding of how a somewhat dated Intel processor works, then read the optimization manual for the processor you use, and you'll have a much better foundation for your work.

Figure out how to use Intel vTune or similar, and you'll be able to get a good idea of what your system is doing. Read posts about Netflix's CDN machines, which are very high performance networking machines; you'll absorb a lot of information and terminology, hopefully.

Sorry, that doesn't help you meet people, I'm a curmudgeon and don't have advice there. Cultivate your network of people you'ld like to bounce ideas off of? But keep in mind, lots of people want to leave work at work.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Inside-Machine-Introduction-Microproc...