This is a work of fiction. All characters depicted are 18 years and over.
This is all new to me, so I have no idea where to start. I guess the beginning is as good as any place. Of course I do not mean the very beginning, after all I do not remember anything before I was about three or four.
My name is Dora Walker. Currently I am 18 years old and at least passable in the looks department. My hair is a light brown, I am 5 ft. 4 in. tall, and I weigh in at just over 125 lbs. I do keep myself in shape by walking almost everywhere.
For as long as I can remember I have been a planner. I plan everything. Once I started school I planned my courses and schooling. I planned my extra curricular activities, the clubs I joined, and to some extent the friends I made all through school. And I mostly stayed away from boys. It is not that I dislike boys, on the contrary, I like them very much. But they are a huge distraction from my goals in life.
You see, I have wonderful parents. My mother is a high school mathematics teacher and my father is a computer scientist who works for a large computer manufacturer. They are both great parents and have provided me with everything I could want in life. My dad has been especially influential on me as he introduced me to computers. He gave me my first computer and kept it up to date over my elementary, middle, and high school years.
I am completely in love with computers. There is nothing which gives me more satisfaction than writing a useful program. Or a game. Or a database. Or a search algorithm. Well, you get the idea. I like everything about them. From the way you can control the machine itself to the way you can interface it to other objects like cameras, music, listening devices, video, and all means of other devices.
My dad was always encouraging me to stretch myself even more. By the time I graduated from high school I knew 12 different computer languages and had experience with Windows, Linux, and a few smaller platforms. I loved everything about them. And by my senior year I was planning my college education.
I applied to only three colleges. I figured my academics were good enough to get me into any of the three I applied and thus I would have a choice of where to go for the best education in computer science. Oh, I forgot to tell you that I did not apply to any colleges on either coast. I wanted something in the central US as I did not want to be that far from my parents (and their good advice). And close enough to go home between semesters. But I also wanted to be far enough away that I could spread my wings if I wanted.
I was accepted by all three colleges, but it was much harder to choose which one to attend than I thought it would be. All three were really attractive from an academics perspective and all three offered other incentives as well. It took me over a week and many conversations with my parent to make my choice. In the end the University of Texas won out. I just ignored the athletic programs at all the colleges and when I did that, UT was the obvious choice. Besides the excellent computer science program there were excellent housing choices, a first rate library, state of the art computers, and a really great faculty of teachers and professors.
During the summer between high school and college I made plans for my college career, with the help of my parents. They were more than generous by paying all my expenses and providing me spending money. Mom found a really nice apartment for me less than a mile from the computer engineering building. But while it was fairly close to the computer building it was even further away from where I would take my other required subjects like English, Math, and History. It would require that a bicycle be used to commute from my apartment to all of my classes (UT is unbelievably big and spread out). That would still keep me in shape while I concentrated on my academics. The down side is that, believe it or not, Austin can have cold weather in the winter. Not all the time, but enough to be annoying. And, of course, rain is always a problem. I would just have to put up with it.
At the beginning of August mom helped me move in to my apartment. It was just a little one bedroom affair with a small kitchen and a fair size bathroom. It was on the first floor so the bicycle was not a problem. Mom and I went shopping and furnished my future apartment with everything I needed for four years. Since the apartment had a nice size refrigerator we stocked it with food and filled the cabinets with other food plus dishes, glasses, silverware, and other utensils. Then we went shopping for outer ware for the year like a coat, some sweaters, a rain coat, a sun hat (needed in Texas), and sundry school accessories. Dad supplied my computers (yes, I would have more than one) and a little networking equipment. The apartment complex already had an Internet provider so I did not have to worry about that.
Mom left by the 15th of August and I was alone for the first time in my life. But that was not for long as classes started the next week with freshmen introductions. August is a hot month in Austin but the bicycle ride to and from UT was not as bad as I thought it would be, except for the traffic. It was necessary to be really careful as car drivers seem oblivious to cyclists in Austin. Luckily, I was not the only cyclist on the road so I guess it was not as bad as it could have been.
Classes actually started the week before Labor Day. One of my first computer science classes was an Introduction and Comparison of Computer Languages. I figured this would be an easy class for me but man was I wrong! During the semester I would learn four new computer languages that I had no experience with. This was not going to be a free ride class! Most of these were mainframe languages and that class of hardware does not just sit in someone's bedroom.
But luck was with me as the professor paired me with another student. My partner was a freshman who actually had a little experience with two of the four languages I did not have experience with. His mother and father were both employed by a large airline as computer programmers so they had brought him up to speed on them. His name was Kelly and he was pretty handsome. If I had been in the market I would have scooped him up in a minute, but I was determined not to become involved and risk my academic career. I really wanted a degree in computer science and that came first.
But he was fun to look at.
Also, it turns out that was not the only class that we attended together. We also had the class Objects and Instances together. We were both at least somewhat familiar with that topic. That class did not pair students together but we still studied together. Needless to say, we started spending a lot of study time together, mostly either at the library or my apartment because he lived in dormitory housing.
We started meeting in the library at first as it was sort of central for both of us. After a few meetings, it turns out that we had a lot in common. We were both very set on getting our degrees and were planners. This aspect of our personalities turned out to have big consequences for both of us.
After about four weeks of studying together at the library, and sometimes my apartment, Kelly spoke up one evening. "I'm hungry, you want to get something to eat?"
"Sure. What are you hungry for?"
"There is a spot not far from here just off campus. They have decent food at fair prices. They also have a wide variety of offerings."
"That sounds like a good place. Let's pack up and go."
We packed up our laptops and left the library. I had to pick up my bicycle as we left and walk it to our destination. But it was not that far.
The restaurant turned out to be pretty nice. Just across the street from the campus it really was close. It was a small place but had decent furniture and the staff was nice. Kelly ordered a small pizza and I ordered a sandwich and chips.
"So what do you think of professor Thomas?" Kelly asked.
Professor Thomas taught our Computer Languages course. "He seems knowledgeable about the topic. So far he has been pretty good about assignments and quizzes."
"Yeah, I feel the same. How are you doing in your other classes?"
"Pretty good so far. But it is bound to get harder. I am spending a lot of time studying but it seems to be paying off."
"Yeah, me too. But my social like seems to be taking a beating with all this study time. It is hard to meet people outside my classes."
I smiled. "Not time to meet girls?"
He smiled back. "Or keep up a relationship. I always seem to find the time in high school. But the load seemed lighter then. Now I seem to barely have time to maintain any social life."
"I can appreciate that, but only from an academic point of view. I never had much of a social life in high school. I was always too busy studying or playing with my computers. That is how I got to know my way around a keyboard. My dad introduced me to computers at an early age and I fell in love with them."
"I have to admit that you seem very good. I don't have quite the background you do but I get by. My dad and mom introduced me to computers. They even let me have some time on their company's mainframe."
"Yeah, I am kind of jealous of that. I never got any of that kind of experience. Just PCs and some mid-range experience."
But for some strange reason, I wanted to hear more about his relationships with girls.
"It kept me pretty busy. No time for boys, which I regret some times. I think I might have missed out on some growing experiences."
"I think you may have missed out, although it does not seem to have had a negative impact on you. I had three girlfriends in high school, only one of them was any where near serious. That was with Shirley. We were together about nine months and things got pretty hot near the end."
