Unlikely Inspiration & Timely Luck that Made Greats

[SlimTrae]

Well this didn't make me great, but it was unlikely that a guy from the hood who barely graduated (without military I would've been held back in 12th grade) would survive, then thrive in IT.

Took a scam class from a community college for computer programming. No one hired me so I got my first gig(s) known then as a printer operator or peripheral operator working in data centers with computer operators.
The oldest computer mainframe had data stored on tapes. Looks like an 8 track cartridge along with large printers called impact printers.
1996ish contractors were despised, considered job thieves. & After the company I 1st worked at forced about a dozen workers to quit from my temp/contractor, I was the last one they could find.

Reason for quitting:

All temps were forced to do either tape mounting -which was exhausting if say 15 tape requests, you had to run to a library of moveable shelves to find them or... constantly unjamming large printers, stacking unstacking 40lb boxes of paper.
Computer operators kept resigning because they wanted to use their brain for monitoring/resolving issues.
Well they saw me and knew I wouldn't last. Keep this guy running for boxes of paper and tape mounts.

What they did not know was how fearful I was, no knowledge, no confidence. Had they put me on a console no doubt I would've quit! I didnt know shit about Ca7 scheduler, TSO, editing programs, nada!

After a month a problem occurred; they realized they were getting comfortable not doing those physical duties. And I began watching what they were doing to resolve issues be it software (DBA, programming) or hardware (server)related. aka gained confidence.
if a server needed to be rebooted I noticed how they wondered from one row of servers to the next to find it(3-7 minutes)- shit I thought, none of this is documented? In my spare time I documented every row, ever cabinet, every shelve. Name of server, IP address, static or dynamic (didnt know what it meant back then).

So when they saw how cool I was with doing manual labor, they thought they could get rid of me by asking me to reboot a server- request to fire him for taking too long to find it, but I went str8 to the location and did it within a minute.
My boss had me put it on the latest technology back then known as Lotus notes 1-2-3 today Xcel spreadsheet.
Top out pay 1998 was like 45k. & because they were all 40 & over, they didnt know jack about Lotus notes or Word perfect (Microsoft word).

Because major corporations (3 thousand employees or more) can't get off mainframe, and no college university to teach it, I got my recent gig at 65K-cause most skilled mainframers are A. retired B. dead.
Who would've thought a guy who dropped out of a high school class called computers in 2 weeks, would make a living in computers.

The very group of operators who never made more than 45k, got me this gig I'm at today was by refusing to let me do console. Shit backfired! I had a ball- putting on my Walkman, earphones, listening to Morris Day & The Time, Prince while mounting tapes & doing what I did in factories -lifting 40lb boxes for 20k a year.
I'm 1/2 as knowledgeable as they were yet I out earn them by 20k a year!!!!!
Only in America!