---
title: "Winter Ahead"
slug: winter-ahead
date: 2025-12-18T21:00:13-06:00
draft: false
---

:snowflake: :snowman_with_snow: :cloud_with_snow:

There's too many ideas to cram into one post in the last eight months. First, my bad for struggling to keep this updated. Life has a way of distracting you when you have two young kiddos. Secondly, a lot of things have weighed very heavily on me this year. Based on [previous posts](https://zoness.me/posts/2025/04/earth-day-notes-2025/) you can probably gather that the state of the American, and frankly western, political world isn't exactly thriving.

I did start to make my voice heard this year. I attended my first protest for [No Kings](https://www.nokings.org/) on June 14th then again on October 18th. I plan to do many more times next year. I also began attending a local Unitarian Universalist church as I triangulate my faith values into something with tangible community and institutional presence. It has been a priority for me this year to converge my whole worldview into something more concrete and ationable: I am more overt in my liberal politics and in my religious faith which is pretty nontraditional.

I don't need to spend large amounts of time on the specific political events of the year but I am heartened by the positive change and revolt that is beginning on the ground and translating into major [political wins](https://www.npr.org/2025/11/05/nx-s1-5599185/2025-election-results-georgia-pennsylvania-democrats-win) in historically dead off-year elections. 
There is genuinely a lot to take away from these results but I will start with the obvious: people are PISSED. It's me, I'm people, but I am not the only one. We had [unexpected upsets](https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/elections/virginia-attorney-general-winner-election-race-jason-miyares-jay-jones-rcna238916) that have really signalled how frustrated people are increasingly becoming. No more do they feel that we have to "play nice". I also feel this way. I spent a decade pretending like being a peacekeeper has added value to discourse in my personal life, but I have just watched people close to me get more extreme. No more will I tolerate it.

Lots of other things are changing that are not pure politics. Looking forward...

Community involvement is taking front and center stage in my life: politics, religion, school for my kids and frankly my own hobbies. For the second year in a row I've attended Midwest FurFest and met decades-long internet friends at the occasion. I've been refining my fursona of a bighorn sheep over that year and I will probably post artwork in the future!
I intend next year to be more time spent in nature with my kids as they get older and more curious about the world around them. My oldest turns four next spring and I want him to learn about his natural world; trees, plants, animals, rivers, the weather, the stars. 
I also hope to travel more with my wife now that we are past that new parenthood stage, that will be nice to bring some little adventure back! So far I have a trip to Colorado on the books and who knows what else might come our way!

Looking ahead at the blog I have some useful miscellany I'll get around to posting. My biggest technical project right now self-hosting git repos to centralize my config files. Not exactly the hardest thing in the world but I am far enough in my career now where I kind of want everything I work with to work _exactly_ the way I like it. Oh, I have lots of opinions of AI as well which is of course quite liable to eat this post up too. Say hi to Sam for me!
I will be writing more in general next year, documenting the evolving political situation as well as my continued technical journey as I continue to move towards open source and away from big tech.

I don't have any special words really to say at the close of the year here, or at least nothing especially profound. To all of you readers or bots out there, have a blessed winter or summer solstice. Keep your head held high and look forward to next year with hope.