If anyone feels this way and wants to try an alpha I have 1,000+ hours in.. I've implemented a Windows 10-like UI for MacOS. Similar to uBar (ubarapp.com).

The key distinction is it's built to be extended with third-party plugins (think Obsidian). I stopped using uBar because it had features I needed, but it's not actively adding features anymore last I checked. And of course, this will be fully open source.

This solves a lot of problems I have feeling productive in any not-MATE UI. More here: https://progress.compose.sh/about

It's in active alpha development but has all the core features you'd expect: taskbar works great, but only a basic system tray and start menu. And it'd be very much an alpha that needs feedback :-)