Valerie here, Hitty Aliza fell asleep waiting for a turn at my new netbook. Without having to wait for three big people to finish using the laptop, she thought she would be able to keep up with her blog a lot better. She did not count on the perils of a technogeek with a new toy.
My husband and I did our bit to stimulate the economy by spending a chunk of our income tax refund on new computers. It is so cute and so easy to use. I have wanted one since I saw my friend Jo's.
Now, I am sitting in bed blogging-How cool is that! My father was a computer programmer and analyst. He was very good at what he did. My father could think in bianary and write programs in code straight from his head. It unnerved the programmers around him at times. When I was growing up, we were the only house with a dedicated line and modem to connect to a mainframe computer at his work place.
My father made sure I knew how to keypunch so that I would always have a job. He died in 1985-the same week as my 10 year high school class reunion. I never made it to that reunion-or any of them since. He had been talking about buying an Apple computer. My mother was horrified at the thought of the expense. He never got a computer of his very own.
I still miss him. I miss him most when I marvel at the leaps and bounds that technology has taken in so few years. I have more power in my netbook than the main frame my father used so many years ago. He would have loved the wireless age. I can see him on his boat fishing with a laptop that can get to the internet on a mobile phone signal and commuting via the internet when called on his cellphone. He would have loved it.
I never take for granted the marvels of our age-after all I stilll remember learning to keypunch.
Still missing you Daddy,
Valerie
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Oh, Valerie. We may be soul sisters. My dad, who I miss greatly, worked for what was once called Remington Rand - his job was repairing the UNIVAC computer when it broke down. I will never forget seeing one for the first time - it filled an entire small room, all climate controlled, three walls filled with what seemed like a hundred reel-to-reel tape decks and lots of lights and switches. One wall of the room was glass so you could see inside. He was a math major with a French minor - an interesting person and the best daddy ever. I have in my possession a punch card that he made for my mom and me. Ah, the good old days.
ReplyDeleteI refer to my DH as Mr. Science - his degrees were electronic engineering, biology, and physics. He knows everything - math, all the sciences, computers, electrical stuff - you name it. But he also writes very well and can draw too. A renaissance man. He bought the kids a computer when they were really little, so they grew up with one. Our son was writing programs when he was only 8 years old. Today, he is a software design engineer and team leader for Microsoft. But I think my daddy's genes totally skipped me - I can add and subtract, but don't ask me to work a formula or anything complex like that. I'm an art and English person, and that's it.
I miss my dad more than any other person. But weren't both of us just so lucky to have those men in our lives? He made me smile every day. Happy
Happy, the more I learn about you, the more I know that we were destined to be friends. All we needed to do is meet, and Hitty provided the introduction.
ReplyDeleteValerie
What wonderful thoughts of your father...I do believe he was as lucky to have you as a daughter as you were to have him as a dad!
ReplyDelete