My 44th birthday is coming up in August. Birthdays don’t freak me out (you couldn’t pay me to be 20 again). But they do make me contemplative. I like to evaluate where I’ve gone in the last year, and where I want to go in the next—in both my life and career.

I definitely haven’t stayed on the wide, smooth, paved highway. My journey has been more like Highway 1 in California: winding, breathtaking, and a little bit scary, with lots of random side roads that lead you to awesome stuff like giant fiberglass dinosaurs. Somehow all the disparate places I’ve traveled to in my career have led me to where I am today, and, more exciting, where I’m going next.