your great-grandfather: 60 hours in a factory, owned a house at 25, 4 kids. you: 60 hours on spreadsheets, rent at 35, 4 houseplants.

“but we have technology!” yes, we replaced physical exhaustion with existential exhaustion.

he came home tired but satisfied. you come home tired and check slack. his wife respected him for providing. your girlfriend has a backup roster in her DMs.

his meaning came from building things. yours comes from optimizing KPIs for shareholder value. we traded calloused hands for anxiety disorders and called it progress