This Thanksgiving, I’m thinking about the random events in my childhood and teen years that led to my career as a software developer.

In middle school, I was lucky to have teachers like Mr. Abbey and Mr. Penner who got me into my first programming class, and Mrs. Cohen, who taught me to type.

My mom, who got me my first computer at Radio Shack.

My Aunt Grace, who got me a summer job in her office where a random programmer there took me aside and taught me SQL and where they had me make all of the spreadsheets in Lotus.

To the random guy at Barnes and Noble, who saw me in the programming book area and hired me to help him with a program he needed for his business.

Very thankful to the Randomness, the Great Creator.