To Lost Dreams

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To say my ALX journey has been a bumpy ride is an understatement, but I guess what journey doesn’t have its bumps. For those of you unaware of what ALX is it is software engineering program offered to students across Africa. When the program began I was excited, as is any person starting something afresh. However mid-way through it I started getting overwhelmed and frustrated at the sheer amount of work and lack of time I had to do it.  And surely enough there was a point I wanted to quit but I stuck it out. Recently we have just finished our portfolio projects, where my partner and I worked on a simple CV builder app focusing on the simplistic user experience of creating and sending CV/Resume.

On this project I worked on the backend, which comprised of a PostgreSQL database and an API developed using Flask. This was a growth experience for me because all through my career when I did work on projects it was usually assumed that I would work on the frontend because courtesy of my gender it seemed that I would have a better handle on the aesthetics aspect of the application. I am also proficient in mobile development using android studio and have worked on SQLite as well as firebase real-time databases. However this was a different experience which I kind of felt deprived of. So in that way I learnt a lot about myself doing this backend development. And though just like any learning process I had my ups and downs in the process but by digging deeper within I was able to find  solutions which I would have otherwise convinced myself that I could not find

When I began my career in software development, I started by teaching myself website development by learning languages such as html, JavaScript, css. The plan however was always to explore more of the different aspects of the development. When I got my first software development position because I did not have much experience in backend development I worked on front-end. Mainly due to this unspoken opinion that backend development was rather complex and therefore not a good fit for someone of my gender.  So in trying to be compliant I accepted my tasks quietly, but knowing that I truly had a desire to know more about backend development.  The thing is however that sometimes when people speak things over your life subconsciously you turn to absorb them and make them your beliefs. So even after several years in this industry I think I carried that.

But lo and behold the ALX program became an opportunity for to exorcise this demon I had buried and this project really allowed me explore this. I am also truly thankful for my partner whose patience and guidance helped me get through those thorny little pricks that at times felt like mountains I could not move.  So here is to the ALX program for reviving long lost hopes and dreams.

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