Today is my last day at Slack.

I’m taking time off to not think about work and then maybe some time off to think about work. I’ll be forever cursed with 20 things I want to build on top of Slack so I might try a few of those. It’s all so unclear and that’s just fine.

I certainly, absolutely want to get lunch or coffee with friends so DM me on Twitter or Instagram or olde-tyme e-mail.

I haven’t actually left a job like this in about a decade. I was lucky to work on projects for clients (and our own stuff) for nearly five years after Federated Media and then lucky to start here. I forgot what it feels like to tell people you see every work day for years that you aren’t going to see them again for a long time and maybe forever.

I tried sitting down and writing about Slack the company and my five years here but it all seems too big to do.

I went to fly a kite once with my son when he was about 5 years-old and we started letting it out and out and out until it was a tiny speck in the sky. The string was invisible just a few yards from my hands. I knew I was connected to the kite since I had watched it float away, but it was hard to see just how.

I will never forget looking over to my son and he had a scared, nearly terrified look on his face. He pleaded with me to reel it back in and so I did. We never flew that kite again.

I thought about that for a while until I felt like I understood it. And now I think I am experiencing it. The story of Slack is vast. Slack the company is a big place. There are engineering levels and working groups and software design committees and 400 person social channels that seem incomprehensibly large to me and it’s only going to feel bigger and bigger.

So I feel like reeling it in a bit and trying something else.

I’m going to miss what this place was. It’ll never happen to me again in my lifetime. It’s rare you get to go through something like this and be hyper-aware of how special it is every day you come into work. I’ve done this long enough to know that.

I got super fucking lucky and I am super fucking grateful for all of it.