2 ms·

What an evocative story. I watched it in my head like a movie. The moment when you learned you wanted to be a programmer was epic.

• kstrauser 4y ago
  Thank you. That was one of the few life-changing moments in my life. It was so obvious in retrospect. I'd been glued to the screen since I started typing in programs from the backs of magazines in elementary school. It wove a powerful spell over me: "you own this little universe, and you can make it do anything you want it to -- as long as you can discover the right incantations." I was hooked. I guess I'd thought of becoming a doctor even earlier and it had somehow stuck in my head, even though that clearly wasn't my true passion. I don't know why it hadn't occurred to me before then that maybe, just maybe, I should consider that my favorite hobby was also a nice career path. When my boss (who I profusely thanked later in life) pointed that out to me, I was blown away. I didn't sleep well afterward, at first because I had seen my whole planned future fall apart and re-form in a completely different way, and later because I couldn't wait to get started. I've never looked back, not for a second. This is what I was meant to do. I love it, I'm good at it, and I've never since wanted to do anything else.