[r a n d o m h u m a n]

I didn’t have experience, I had education. Other people lived, I was processed. Ok, ok, I exaggerate. Life is a wonderful happy shiny thing.

Sometimes life gets in the way of computers. Periodically I lock myself in my room for a month and do nothing but tinker with my computers. I only emerge when I get really stuck on something, get fed up, or start thinking that maybe I should be doing something better with my time. I enjoy it, despite the bleary eyes and throbbing head, despite not being able to relate to anybody afterwards, I just wish I had something useful and productive I could actually do with my skills.

I still have to do it though, even if I never achieve anything with it. I have to reassure myself that there’s something, one tiny little thing in this world that I have a hope of understanding. It’s like a drug the way it alters my conciousness and personality. The world melts away. Politics don’t matter. Friends don’t matter. Life doesn’t matter. When I wrote BASIC I used to dream in code. Maybe this is the escape I’m always trying to find somewhere else…

Writing has a similar, but subtley different effect on me. When I’m messing with computers, all my problems and depressing thoughts kind of fade into the background, but when I’m done they come back with a vengeance. When I write, I’m letting the shit out, so I can move on. It gives me the same feeling, but for a different reason. That must be why I’m such a damn perfectionist and never actually write anything, if I get it wrong it’ll ruin everything.

I think I need both.