My original intention was to write this a week or two after my last day at Spiceworks, with the goal of sort of silently slipping into the night. But, as we all know, the best-laid plans rarely go, well, as planned. There is this great thread in the Spiceworks Community that Z started, and I feel like I can only do so many spice-ups (that’s the primary ‘like’ in the reaction system for Spiceworks, for anyone unfamiliar) before I actually post. And it’s a safe guess that one of the first responses to any reply I have will be, “What happened?”
For anyone looking for some juicy tidbits, I’ll give you the TL;DR — Not really going to spill the beans (or is it tea now? 6-7? Okay, I’ll stop) on a lot of the behind-the-scenes things. What I will say is that I’ve left behind an incredible team who I know will keep moving forward and may ultimately do better (or at least differently in a good way) without me. To be clear, not one of the reasons I left, but one of the reasons I felt I could leave.
What’s next for me? Honestly, I don’t know, which is scary, of course. I can’t think of the last time I was actually unsure what I’d do professionally next since before joining the Marine Corps (which wasn’t exactly yesterday). Almost every time I’ve left a company, I’ve had something else lined up, usually before I left. The one exception was UTV Ignition, when the studio started closing, but even then, I hit the ground and quickly narrowed it down to (at the time) two great choices: 38 Studios and Spiceworks. For those of you who don’t know what happened to 38 Studios (TL;DR — 38 Studios bet everything on an ambitious MMO, ran out of money before it could ship, and imploded despite releasing a well-reviewed Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning), you’ll see why it was ultimately good that I passed on that.
Back to my point, this is the first time I’ve stood still instead of already plotting a course forward. Not that I don’t have ideas in mind, but my primary goal is to be a bit selfish and take a bit of time for myself. Which I honestly don’t think I’ve ever done (at least not to this degree). For anyone who’s worked with me (or even known me outside of work), I’m a bit of a workaholic who tends to chase perfection (I say it like that because I know I never achieve that, if any of us ever do). I’ve defined a lot of myself by what I do, both professionally and for my family. For example, going back to 38 Studios, the primary reason I passed on that is that it would require me to move to Rhode Island, but my daughter would be living in Texas. The salary would have afforded me the ability to travel back often, but I didn’t really want to be a weekend (or every other weekend) father. I chose Spiceworks, which ironically gave me a good work-life balance so I could be active in her life. Now my daughter is a doctor and married to a soon-to-be lawyer (just waiting on bar exam results), so I could have definitely done worse.
So, I’m standing still a little bit to take some time to figure out what I want to do. Why can’t I just do that while at Spiceworks? There’s an analogy I use a lot when writing content — you can’t unburn toast. So I’m taking a little bit of time to scrape off the burnt layer and get a better balance of blood and coffee in my veins so I can make a better decision instead of just reacting.
Granted, I am not independently wealthy (or anywhere near that), so I will work again, probably not too far into the future. But ever since Rhonda left Spiceworks (which would have been late 2024), I’ve been working to clear my debt and save up, because the industry has been so, shall we say, interesting these last few years. You know, the whole “hope for the best but plan for the worst” mindset. In case I got voluntold or something went sideways, I wanted to be financially stable enough to weather the storm.
While neither of those happened, it has allowed me to stand still for a bit and work on myself, both physically (I am so out of shape) and mentally. And I want to use that time to detox a bit and, while I hate saying it this way (but I can’t think of a better way), find myself. And that is so much easier said than done. I’ve been struggling with this decision for a while now… probably even longer than I realize.
It probably started around when Jason left Spiceworks, just after SpiceWorld 2025. Prior to that, I absorbed some responsibilities when our last (Spiceworks) email marketing team member left, and I became that team. Then I absorbed a few more when Josh and Jason left. Spoiler: Josh is back at Spiceworks! As people left, I gradually inherited their responsibilities while we worked through ways to transition or retire parts of the work. We made progress in some areas, but there was only so much we could realistically redistribute. I realized I was trying to solve a structural problem through personal effort. I wasn’t transitioning things properly, so I started looking for every opportunity to redirect the resources we did have toward the team. One of those decisions ultimately helped get Josh back.
I submitted my resignation after the Fourth of July weekend, which had some symmetry to it, as it was roughly the date I returned after my “Cisco vacation” and was my personal independence day. And about six weeks later, August 14th became my last working day.
Which brings me to this week. I sent my last Spiceworks Newsletter and Poll of the Week email on Sunday (for the APAC crowd, queued up the EMEA and North America ones to send on Monday). Monday was my first day where I woke up past 8 AM… okay, that’s a lie; I still woke up at 6 AM, but I didn’t actually get moving around or have my first coffee until 8:30ish. I ended up playing a bit of Minecraft, (re)watching Supernatural (again), talking with folks, and doing some projects around the house that I’ve been putting off for way too long. And I imagine the next week or two will go something like that as I detox (not from drugs or alcohol, to be clear) and reset myself (reboot three times, right?).
Then I will seriously start contemplating what the future holds for me, once I have stable ground under my feet and am not just reacting out of fear and anxiety. And I will work again. As I said, I am not independently wealthy and, believe it or not, I’m not getting any younger. That is part of what scares me about right now: I will be dipping into money I’ve been using to prepare for retirement, which will adjust that plan. And goes against how I was raised (always working, always saving). But I truly feel it was (and is) the right decision, as I’ve suddenly had the best sleep I’ve had in months, and I didn’t realize how much I needed the chance to slow down. And yesterday actually felt good, outside of hating leaving my team with the (additional) load they now carry. We’ll see how I feel a few weeks from now when that first payday doesn’t come, heh.
What does the future hold? Luckily, I have options, as I’ve done a lot over the years (and years) I’ve been working. I’ve been in community management, game development, product management, project management, and most recently running a large-scale newsletter — creating the content and running the full operations for it: writing, using email templates, and queueing/sending via an ESP (Email Service Provider). Maybe I’ll start my own thing (kidding, but also partially not kidding).
Anyone who’s had to put up with me knows my dream is to lead my own MMO, and maybe I’m crazy enough to try it (granted, I’d build a mobile game first). But more than likely, I’ll re-enter the workforce and try to find something that doesn’t just fit my skills but also my views on organizational leadership… including that work-life balance thing so I can refresh my design docs on game development, heh (got to have a project to look forward to for retirement).
As for Spiceworks specifically, the nice thing is you don’t have to work at Spiceworks to be part of the Community. So it will be less frequent, but I will definitely be active there. Besides, I will still have Linux and networking questions to be answered… who better to ask?
Anywho, I will also be actually updating this site again. Not that I think it will ever become a “site”; it will always be my “blahg,” and I find it interesting to go back and re-read it every so often. For example, it was early 2022 when I paid off my debt consolidation, and I finally paid off my mortgage in early 2025 (which has been a life-changer in itself). So it’s fun for me to go back and read some of this and remind myself of the various steps of my journey — granted, I’m not starting a LiveJournal (wow, that site is still around?!) 😀
Anyways, I’m off to tinker a bit with my new Linux box as I’m setting it up for Minecraft. I’ve currently got Ubuntu 26.04, Wings, and Pterodactyl set up on it. Maybe I’ll throw a Matcha Flavoured datapack server on there and take it for a spin.