The Apple & The Turtle

Computers were, initially, a crushing disappointment. When our sixth grade teacher announced that I was one of the special few that had been chosen for the computer class, I was excited. The machines certainly looked better than what I’d seen on Star Trek. A monitor and keyboard encased in beige plastic certainly looked more futuristic than the big boxes with blinking lights that dotted the pop culture landscape.

But using those Apple II computers turned out to be nothing like what I’d seen on The Jetsons. The first couple of times that I made the little green triangle move across the screen were fun, but pushing it across the screen got progressively less and less interesting the more our little class of brainiacs did it.

And when our teacher tried to get the little robot to move in tandem with the “Turtle” on the screen, the results were…underwhelming. Our teacher spent most of the class racing back and forth between his computer and the twitching, humming, slow moving robot on the floor. Real-life computers and robots weren’t half as glamorous, or smart, as the ones I’d see on Astroboy after school.

When I found out that my friend (who had been deemed less intelligent) had spent an agreeable morning drawing and painting in an extended art class, I asked if I could drop out. However, quitting was not an option, according to my teacher. I was intelligent, resources were limited, and I should be more grateful for the opportunities presented to me.

Suitably chastened, I resumed spending most of computer class watching the teacher try to make the robot work its magic on the floor. Since then, I’ve taught my share of classes and I realize that Steve Jobs wasn’t the person responsible for the dull class. The blame for that can be placed entirely on the shoulders of our teacher, who probably hadn’t done adequate lesson planning.

All was not lost. The public sector of The People’s Republic of Saskatoba might have dropped the ball when it came to preparing me for a fun-filled future full of flying cars, holo decks, and replicants, but the private sector, in the form of my Dad, helped revive my flagging interest a few months later when he purchased, or started buying, the components of a Commodore 64.

Our family was one of limited means, so the purchase was made piecemeal. The keyboard was the first piece that we had. I hooked it up to the black and white television, and to my delight, discovered that I could make pictures with the keyboard. I started building little forts, tanks, cannons, and aircraft, and set about demolishing them using the delete and cursor keys.

It was certainly a lot more fun than watching the turtle move ever so slowly across the screen. And once we got the disk drive…oh, the wonderful mayhem I could unleash on the screen. Mom might have flipped out when she saw the X-Men cover where Storm was getting ready to stab some hapless evil mutant with a dagger, but I could strike down as many foes as I wanted to with a digital katana and I wouldn’t hear so much as a single objection from my mom.

Was really I learning anything about computers, though? I suppose, at the very least, that Commodore 64 taught me that computers wouldn’t bite. At best, Dad grasped on an intuitive level (and I learned from his example) that a desktop or a laptop represents better all-around value for money than a gaming platform.

As for that friend of mine whose intelligence was deemed insufficient enough to handle the challenges of computer class?

He is currently teaching high school chemistry.