M(i)A: Forgot Password?

Memory, Identity & Betrayal

Come closer, dear reader. Thanks for asking me to write more of these reminiscences.¹

I had a wonderful career—I got to travel the world, live on 2 continents in many different cities, made & shipped soap & shampoo around the world and got to work with amazing people. What more could one ask for?

I used to lead global teams. Now I lose to login screens.

But there's one mistake from my working days that bothers me: not spending more of my time creating, entering, and re-entering passwords.

I'm ashamed to admit that for decades, I got by with a couple of passwords scribbled on a Post-it next to my laptop. Until websites started requiring passwords just to check the stock price or read the news. Suddenly, I needed a login for everything. And I realized: nothing makes you feel more alive than registering for an account, making a password, instantly forgetting it, and repeating the whole process for every transaction.

You haven't really lived well until you've reset a password four times just to join a forum on cybersecurity.

Some people say that no one on their deathbed ever said, I wish I'd spent more time at work. It's true, I don't wish I'd spent more time at work. I'm glad that I retired early. But I do wish I'd spent more time on the phone with IT Help Desk, patiently waiting while they authenticated my newly changed password across all my devices, confirming once again that yes, I am indeed myself.

You know, if you do what you love, you'll never work a day in your life. That's why I'm so glad my company made us reset our passwords every three months.

You young folks are so entitled. You expect immediate success. Ping! No one is born knowing how to create and remember scores of different sequences of digits, capital letters, and obscure symbols. Like any world-class craft, you must practice for at least 10000 hours to master the ancient art of passwords with special characters.

You have to make sacrifices. If you spend all your free time with friends and family, you'll never be lonely. But if you spend all your time practicing password entry, you'll never be locked out of that healthy living app you've only used once.

I worry about your future. The ice caps are melting, democracy is on the brink of collapse, and worst of all, passwords are being replaced with Touch ID. Without the constant need to remember and manually type nonsensical combinations of letters and numbers, you'll have no choice but to do terrible things, like pay attention when someone talks to you.

That's why I was so upset when my son told me a deep, dark secret. He's been using an online password manager for the past five years. He doesn't even type the letters himself, it just auto-populates.

I looked at my son, betrayed yet proud. Auto-populate? I whispered. And you call yourself my son?

He nodded. Calm. Confident. That's when I knew: the future was lost.

But perhaps that's okay. After all, I spent my first career conquering global markets. Maybe it's time to let the login screens win.

1. M(i)A: Missing (in) Action—a series about the tools, habits, and team rituals I’ve left behind in semi-retirement.