Whisper🤫 words  of wisdom, let it be

Happy International Beer 🍺 day!

Let me apologize as this a different kind of blog post. If you have been following my journey ✈️ in adventures of learning exciting and interesting technologies you’ll find this update more of life lesson than technology one. 

If you recall last week, we decided to expand on our knowledge on AWS ☁️ by focusing on the core foundation of AWS ☁️ core principals and the well factored architecture. Just as soon as we clicked submit with our summary of last week’s learning, I decided to register to take the Amazon Cloud ☁️ Practitioner exam  through the remote testing option as this would be the coup de grâce of our awesome learning with AWS ☁️.

In effort, to fully prepare myself for the exam 📝 I would dedicate the early part of the week for cramming for the test before moving on to my next journey.

Commencing countdown, engines on…

I was all set to take the exam 📝 on Tuesday and as time ⏰ approached closer to test 📝 time⏰ I decided I should login in early and go through all the pre-checkouts to ensure that my testing environment was in compliance. 

After about 15 minutes of getting everything ready go, I buckled💺up and  began my course but unfortunately Mother Nature 🌬 had other ideas..

Just as soon as I was taken to the disclaimer splash screen I was literally within a microsecond kicked out of the test and unable to get back in.  

At the same time outside, tropical storm ⛈ Isaias was kicking🦵up. Violent winds 🌪 were throwing trees 🌳 and large objects all around. In addition, millions of people in the Northeastern United States were embarking on loosing power 🔌 (in some cases for days), I lost connectivity 💻 with the test 📝 which turned out to be no option to get back in. 😞

As soon as I realized, I couldn’t get back into the test I began a 4.5 hour saga including numerous phone 📞 calls to testing facility including a 2 hour shared session with Tech Support 👩‍💻 in order to figure out what happened and to try to give me an opportunity to take this test 📝.

But to no avail.. It just wasn’t in the cards 🃏🃏I was just simply SOL. My only recourse was to open case with AWS ☁️ (which I did) and re-register for the exam 📝 at a later date. At the time ⏰, I was left devastated 😩. I had been so regimented with my learning journey and was not prepared for such an obstacle to impede my progress.

And here’s to my momma.. Had to listen to all this drama

So feeling sort of hopeless,  I did what any self respecting individual would do. I called my mom to cry 😭. OK, maybe not cry 😢 but certainly complain. My mom like the wise sage she is put things in perspective and set me straight to focus other priorities that I needed to attend to later in the week.

You’ve got to..You’ve got to move! Come on!

So with a little bit of hesitation , I was able to put this momentary lapse of adversity a side and reminded myself of the famous Epictetus quote  “The chief task in life is simply this: to identify and separate matters so that I can say clearly to myself which are externals not under my control, and which have to do with the choices I actually control.”

Next week, I plan take a brief respite but I shall return in 2 weeks recharged 🔋 re-calibrated and ready to go!

“Why, why, why, why, why do you say goodbye, goodbye – wow

Oh no – You say goodbye, and I say hello”

Thanks –

–MCS