Evolution of a SElf-taught Technologist

Or, maybe it started when my best friend sold me his old Linux PC after high school and I had to learn the command line by trial and error.
Or, maybe it started when I hand-coded an HTML website in the late 90s, armed only with a copy of Elizabeth Castro’s HTML 4 for the World Wide Web.
Or, maybe it started when I made games on my graphing calculator instead of doing algebra homework, since “I’ll never need this anyway.”

Regardless of when it started, a theme emerges. Some blend of ADHD hyperfixation, an unexpected technical savvy, and old-fashioned hard knocks led me to where I am today.

Just two years after high school, I found myself working in wholesale telecommunications, building web-based applications for customers to manage their end users, open trouble tickets, and configure their services. I’d come a long way from thinking algebra would never prove useful.

Lessons Hard-Learned

Soon, I was building server-side systems to store, process, and analyze call records in real time for billing and forecasting, all on mid-2000s hardware. The lessons I learned about optimizing databases still serve me today, generations of technology later.

As a living embodiment of the Dunning-Kruger effect, I wasn’t as quick to learn in other areas.

I was actually proud that my first two web apps had no JavaScript, thinking pure CSS2 flyout menus were a remotely tolerable user experience.
I regularly worked on Linux servers as root, up until I accidentally typed rm -Rf / instead of rm -Rf ./ on a production DNS server.
I believed HD-DVDs were going to wipe the floor with Blu-ray discs, since only those new Playstations could even use them.
I thought my hundreds-of-lines-long regular expressions in Perl were the pinnacle of email filtering.
I trusted my roommate was a savvy businessman worth following.

I was wrong on all counts. Some of those mistakes were more costly than others.

Better Influences

Thankfully, I had some excellent influences in my life. Between my ex-wife, my employer at my first agency job, and a lot of excellent coworkers and mentors, I started to slowly get a clue. Too slowly in some areas, looking back.

One of the first lessons I learned was about the value of a good user experience. Building and selling your own product will do that, especially when you’re working with an excellent designer. His guidance (and the incremental obsolescence of ancient browsers) led me into the world of JavaScript in 2006, and it’s been a part of almost every development project I’ve done since.

I will forever be grateful for my time in the agency world. It was there that I was introduced to clean information architecture, search engine optimization, and an assortment of clients I would have never had otherwise. In those days, digital-first agencies were a novelty, and I was far more fortunate than I realized to start there.

Scaling Up

Working at smaller organizations had some perks. While you had to wear a lot of hats, you also got to wear a lot of hats. That exposure granted me a foundational understanding of a lot of core ideas, from marketing strategy to cybersecurity best practices. It honed a number of my skills, from authoring requirements documents to collaboration within cross-functional teams.

Eventually, though, my career landed me in larger organizations, offering me opportunities to specialize in one area or another. Working within an enterprise offers its own challenges, including institutional inertia (slow to start, slow to change, quick to run you over) and extra layers of process and/or politics. My broad experiences from smaller organizations, though, have often served me well in the enterprise world, particularly when liaising between teams or skillsets.

The Nuggets

I’ve wanted to have children as far back as I could remember, but no daydream of yesterday could have prepared me for the wonder, challenge, and unfettered joy in getting to know my little nuggets (who aren’t so little anymore).

My son is a truly kind soul who continues to surprise (and even teach) me with his intuition and empathy. He is his own greatest critic, but he truly shines wherever he applies his clever mind.

My daughter cracked the code of sardonicism at three and has never looked back. Her curiosity and initiative are such a mix of orange cat and golden retriever, you’ll never see her dry humor coming.

I’ll admit I’m a little biased, but I think they’re super cool. It is a true honor to co-parent with their amazing mother, and I grow more proud of them with each day.

Storytelling

I love stories. They come in so many forms, from oral traditions to website layouts, and I love both hearing and telling stories.

As a consumer, I delight in books, movies, and television with coherent plots that lean into character development and at least a little worldbuilding.

My mom gave me Timothy Zahn’s Heir to the Empire for Christmas in elementary school, and I’ve been in love with reading (and Star Wars) ever since. From fantasy and science fiction to historical dramas and biographies, a good story can be all-consuming.

I’ve also gained a strong appreciation for the collaborative storytelling of tabletop roleplaying games. For the uninitiated, I’m talking about that D&D thing that scared everyone in the 80s until they saw it wasn’t so bad in Stranger Things. Whether I’m in front of or behind the screen, I find immersion in the wonderful blend of preparation and improvisation that such stories evoke.

Hobbies

Beyond storytelling, my ADHD never stops being curious. I’m always learning, which means I’m always trying new things. I don’t necessarily have the natural talent that I have found in other things, but they bring me some degree of joy.

I have a mini garden on my balcony, and I do reasonably well with peppers. Tomatoes continue to elude me, but someday I’ll crack that code.

I’m not great in a kitchen, but there are a few things I’m pretty proud of. I make a mean batch of Texas beans with just the right amount of smoke and spice and enough meat to make it a stew. My masala chai gives me a little taste of India, and it’s had a few fans locally. And since my kids love a good breakfast for dinner, I do alright there, too.

I’ve painted a lot of miniatures in pursuit of my D&D hobby, but I never achieved anything excellent. But from three feet away, that 2-inch miniature looks impressive!

Identity

Until my late twenties, I lived a life full of privilege that I could neither name nor recognize. Tragically, my ignorance and total lack of self-awareness resulted in decisions with very real consequences. I have hurt people I cared about, I have failed to live up to my values, and I have — as with my of my early career — had to learn the hard way.

For a long time, I found my identity in attaching myself to others: my friends in high school, my first roommate, my ex-wife. I was whatever I thought they wanted from me. It’s almost like letting someone else define you, but sometimes I didn’t even do that. I let my mental model of them do it.

For a long time, I found my identity in attaching myself to perceived authorities: employers, religious institutions, or simply people I perceived as having some expertise I lacked. I let them define some facet of me. Or, in some cases, my mental model did the job.

In more recent years, I have asked myself hard questions and bumbled through finding their answers.

I’ve sought to stand as myself, to learn myself, and to love myself. Given some of my past choices, that’s a challenge sometimes. But I’m learning self-compassion, self-respect, and some much-needed self-awareness.

Meta note: It’s funny how hard it is to write this section. Personal shame, political fear, and the pursuit of integrity each add hesitations, doubts, and vulnerability. After all, this doesn’t need to be on my website. But this is my acknowledgement of who I am, and where I’ve come from. And so, in my story, it’s important.

I am a parent. Hi, hungry. I’m Dad. Never gets old.

I am an ex. That season is over, but I’m grateful for 19 years of marriage to a great person.

I am queer. I thought I was a straight white male. Still white, at least. The rest is fuzzier than I expected.

I am a nerd. Thankfully, this means an interesting career, and some really fun hobbies.

I am deconstructing. I’ve set aside pieces of my Christian belief system, but I’ll forever hold much of it dear. Love other; love yourself.

I am a felon. Pay attention, kids: don’t follow blindly. A sinking ship can take down its crew, too.

I am emergent. My past informs me; it doesn’t rule me.

And, for the first time in my life, I like me.

And some others do, too…