my father the fanboy

[kaigou]

My dad's not one for effusive shows of emotion, and while he's mellowed since retirement, all my childhood he was relatively intellectual, not emotional. Except for one time (as I found out, years after the fact) when we were stationed in Montgomery, and Grace Hopper was coming to speak. The role of her driver had been assigned to some low-level enlisted man, and when my father found out, he pulled rank. Or, as he put it, he pulled rank like nobody's business and like he never did before or after in all his twenty-year career. He had to beg his boss, his boss' boss, and a few other people, but when the dust settled, he was the assigned driver and probably the entire base knew that this Major with the PhD from GA Tech was an Amazing Grace fanboy of the penultimate level.

I asked him if he told her that he'd worked on systems at the Pentagon that were directly derived from her work. He said it took him all day to work up his nerve to mention it, and even then he stumbled through it, all tongue-tied. (She was apparently quite gracious and complimentary, and encouraged him to continue in the field.) He did not, however, manage to work up the nerve to get her autograph.

Yep, Dad, the shy egghead fanboy.

Now I know where I get it from.


(As a side-benefit, it probably says a lot about the lengths to which my father always encouraged me intellectually, knowing that one of my father's greatest heroes was a woman.)

Comments

[mongrelheart]

What a great story, and how interesting to learn that your dad had a "secret" side to him ;) Sounds like he was a big influence on you.

[sharibet]

That's a lovely story, and a lovely memory of your Dad. Is he a computer scientist? Or a mathematician?

[ramenkuri.livejournal.com]

How cute of your father! And so very cool that Hopper was one of his greatest heroes, and that he got to meet her.