Goodbye, My Work Mac.

I shipped my employer’s Macbook Pro back to the headquarter today. The Macbook was still pretty new. I’d only had it for less than three months. When I received it, after emailing back and forth with IT support for more than half a year, I already knew I wouldn’t keep it long.

Obtaining a new Mac at work used to be easy. We were a tech company, after all. We’d have many computers, accessories, and iPads in the office. You could just tell the IT technicians about your needs and go straight to the supply dispenser to get what you want.

You could also get a new laptop every three years to keep up with Apple’s upgrade cycle, no questions asked.

I didn’t upgrade my machine when I hit the third-year mark, because I liked my machine and it functioned well. Swapping it for a new one felt too excessive.

I didn’t upgrade my machine when I hit the sixth-year mark, because everyone at work was hyped up with the upcoming M1 model, and it was back ordered after the trade war and then COVID.

My first laptop at Pivotal, a 16-inch Macbook Pro from 2015, therefore worked with me for six-plus years. For the better part of those years, I was a proud Pivot, covering my laptop with company-branded stickers. Some people might feel a distaste when they hear Google employees calling themselves Googlers, “what, you don’t have an identity aside from your job?”, but boy I was a proud Pivot. I believed in our mission, I was imbued with the company culture, and I felt that I was a charging force of…