Male, 69, super-stable-married for 46 years, 1 jazz-singer daughter (shameless shout-out promo for
arjanaandivan.com lol). Biomedical engineer. Have worked for myself ever since I assembled a
Heathkit H100 PC in 1983 and realized the PC's potential to redefine the world of work ... and never went back to an office cubicle again. This has given me the freedom of discretionary time ... actually making it possible to develop my public and social side just enough to confuse people as to whether I'm a true geek or not ...
When the subject of geekiness does come up, I describe myself to others as "a high tech artist," which seems to shatter their preconceptions somewhat and make them think that knowing me is actually a positive asset for them (haha). When you think about it, the mental processes we go through in writing code, or taking a widget from conception to prototype, is identical to that of an artist in front of a canvas, or a novelist writing a book. A novelist can sit there alone for years, moving around blocks of sentences on the page, branching into subroutines of character development, reading it all back repeatedly to see how it flows, scrapping entire chapters and rewriting when needed, until it feels finished. And at the end of it, only a few copies may be sold (like our apps haha). The journey is the biggest part of the reward. Are novelists ever referred to as geeks? No.
So we are geeks, but we are also "high tech artists." It makes us easier to understand by those on the "outside." But always wear the geek label proudly. It's an amazing experience that few will ever have or understand.
(By the way, speaking of that Heathkit PC, here's the first hard drive I bought for it in 1985. Was so awesome. 10MB of storage for $500. Gates said it was all I'd ever need in my whole life. Ran so hot I had to use it externally, with a home-brew fan controlled by a thermal switch )