To All You Legends

You ever just pour a glass of wine, sneak outside while the whole house is asleep, and start rewriting your entire life story in your head?

Not the LinkedIn version.

Not the “strategic leader with 15+ years experience in cross-functional excellence” version.

I mean the real one—the one with the plot twists, the corporate cliffhangers, and that one coworker who swore they invented Excel formulas but couldn’t open a PDF.

You sit there, sip in hand, moonlight bouncing off the patio table, and it all comes rushing back…

The team lunches that turned into trauma bonding.

The managers who gave motivational speeches stolen directly from TED Talks.

The Karens who cc’d twelve people on emails about the breakroom fridge.

The Kaylas who ghosted you after five rounds of interviews and still posted about “authenticity” on LinkedIn.

You laugh—not because it was all funny—but because somehow, you’re still here.

After the layoffs.

After the pivots.

After that one time you trained your replacement “for coverage purposes.”

You’re still standing. Maybe slightly crooked. Maybe emotionally caffeinated. But still here.

You remember the coworkers who made it bearable—like Brad from accounting, who brought donuts every Friday and low-key knew everyone’s business before HR did.

You remember the moments where you almost quit, but didn’t.

You remember being the glue, the fixer, the one who stayed late and knew how to unjam the printer without crying.

And now, with your legs up and your glass halfway empty, you think—maybe the system didn’t deserve you, but the story’s not over.

Because every chapter had a purpose.

Even the ones that ended with “We’ve decided to move forward with other candidates.”

So tonight, under this sky, with this glass, I salute:

The quietly resilient.

The laugh-through-the-exit-interview legends.

The ones who kept their dignity when the inbox got cold.

The ones who were overqualified and underappreciated but still showed up anyway.

If no one’s said it lately:

You’re doing better than you think.

And your best stories? They’re not behind you.

So here’s to the survivors of toxic meetings, broken coffee machines, forgotten promotions, and “circle backs” that never came full circle.

Raise your glass.

To the legends.

To you.