Searching for Magic

 For as long as I remember, I have been intrigued by the way the world works. I used to read book full of wonder and magic as well as survival books for different regions. I was amazed by all the things that existed as well as all the things that could only live in our imagination. I moved from a small little ranch to the lovely city of Milwaukee in 2002. I remember the shock that was for me, going from living in a place where I would ride horses through open land, to riding in a car on roads with lights and signs. When I first saw my dad drive a car, I had so many questions. I remember wondering how the car knew when he wanted to turn because the little lights on the dash would point left or right and at the time I didn't know that it was just him moving a lever with his pinky. But it was that wonder that has defined me throughout my life.

The first phone my family had was a cellphone. It was big and cumbersome and came in a small briefcase, and it was the only way to talk to my father at the time. And that was when I realized that magic was real. My father was thousands of miles away, and yet I was able to talk to him, and I heard his voice come through this big black box with the word 'Motorola' etched into it. I had so many questions but no one to that could answer any of them.

As I grew older, I would finally get my hands on a computer. I didn't have any internet connection, and I had no idea what else to do with it other than play solitaire. That was around the time that I started school at Audubon, which was a technology-centric school. That was where I was introduced to peer-to-peer software, social media, and all the software that is used in all different types of industries. It was around this time that I started to experience the ways that the school would harden its security, implementing group policies and proxy servers to manage students access to their hardware and the internet. But we didn't learn anything about the hardware or the underlying software. I did, however, get a chance to have my own computer to start tinkering with.

I love the idea of the internet. I believe I still have that old-school soul of the early internet adopters. The ones that believed that the internet was a great place that should be used to connect people and share ideas. The amount of information available to the world is what I think makes the internet such a beautiful place. It can help you discover who you are, or help you discover passions that you didn't even know you had. There is something magical that occurs between the keystrokes and the EM waves. The way that we crave to be connected, and even push the boundaries of or knowledge to accomplish it. We have overcome many obstacles to get to the place where we are today. I believe that the thing that makes society better than individualism is the ability to create things and coordinate plans as a collective, and make up for each other's shortcomings. And that, to me, is magic as well.