In elementary school, I loved being an AV (audio-visual) library assistant and running the mimeograph machine. I knew all the tricks to getting that film strip projector to work. I was an expert overhead projector operator. And I could thread a 16mm projector faster than anyone.

I was the master of my domain. I was a geek before the pocket protector became the defacto standard geek identification badge.

Fast forward to a time when I had suppressed the geek within to become a lawyer. I even took an English undergrad degree. I was married when I received my Bachelor of Arts, so I’m not sure it counted. But they gave it to me anyway. Then having had a chance to work for a lawyer for a while, I realized I could never be a lawyer—I hated the work too much to study for the LSAT. And so I became a tech writer. What else.

And a few years later, while I furiously scribbled notes on my legal pad, the ancient primitive predecessor to the iPad, I overheard a software engineer say, “It’s not supposed to do that,” while looking at the screen of a computerized simulation going very wrong. At that moment, my mind darted back to my junior high and high school days of banging out BASIC on a Commodore PET, translating the Atari BASIC from the Creative Computing magazine, so that my friends and I could play Adventure.

You are in a deep dark cave. There is a lamp here. What do you want to do?

The microsecond burst of nostalgia closed and I knew then that if I had written the code for that software, it would be doing exactly what I told that computer to do. It took a few years to make the transition, but I let the inner geek out and consumed every computer programming book I could get my hands on. Finally I landed my first professional programming job. And have been doing that for nearly fourteen years now.

And just today, in stand up, I overheard a team member say those immortal words, “It’s not supposed to do that.” My brain seized on the phrase and compelled me to write this post before I could sleep again.

Where did your geek come from?