[midnightmonster]

I don't think I have a passion for "computer stuff", but I really enjoy the craft of programming (and related application design and experience design and general hacky problem solving).

When I was a kid, home computers were barely a thing. We had one, but I only played with it. I thought maybe I'd grow up to be an architect. I took a few programming classes in middle school (logo and basic), but I started messing around with web pages in high school in the late 90's--mostly for publishing, since I liked to write and draw. JavaScript code was relatively small and rarely obfuscated then, so I learned a lot by reading the source of pages with cool layouts or effects. Haven't stopped since then.

Turns out there's a whole field where you can design things to solve problems or create experiences and make them come into being just by thinking about them carefully (and writing down your thoughts). The feedback loop for satisfaction and learning is very tight compared to architecture.