Thanks all for the thoughtful responses–I appreciate the advice!
As surmised, for me this is mostly a funding question (or at least I assume so, since I don’t have any teaching duties). It’s a fair point that although work in Julia makes up a large part of my day-to-day, most of my code is field-specific applications of the Julia ecosystem, rather than major contributions back, so it would be hard to justify attendance as having benefits for my research projects. But I think I still see value in attending, given my interests and aspirations, so I’ll probably keep trying to find an avenue.
I guess attending this year will be mostly a question of whether or not I am able to find external funding that matches my situation well enough (or can make it happen out of pocket).
Here’s hoping I might be there to see some of you in Pittsburgh!