An actor.

Actor or rockstar.

I remember my mom telling stories about me putting on the huge mid-70's headphone we'd had since I could remember. I'd put them on, grab the end like a microphone and coerce my mom or dad into saying "Here comes Jolly John!!"

Now, my name's not John, and no one I've ever met has known anyone by that name. Jolly John. My first role, I suppose.

I could talk about how much the thrill of imparting knowledge and beauty to others fills me with pride and warmth. I could talk about the love that a cast brings to a final performance. I could talk about the girls, the notoriety, the closeness that only performance can bring, the veteran-esqu stories that come out whenever we get together. But that's all just grown-up rationalization for wanting people to pay attention to me. It makes me happy.

That's probably selfish and egotistical, but it's how it feels. If I fight it, i only feel sad. If I go with it, I just might entertain someone. *shrug* I guess I'm lucky. I found what makes me happy.

Adam {sanctumail@yahoo.com}

I was five years old when I first saw the movie Top Gun. After that, I wanted to be an Air Force pilot.

My dad even started calling me Maverick.

My parents redecorated my room. The wallpaper had fighter planes on it.

Then my dad got a laptop computer that he could take home from work. He showed my how to play games in DOS.

In my eyes, computers replaced airplanes as the coolest machines made by humans. Gradually, my days of playing Top Gun amd Jetfighter video games gave way to working on web sites. And that's what I'm still doing today.

Aaron {aaron@ktheory.com}

I wanted to be a journalist.

Hey, neat!

I think.

Luke

I was always convinced I would be a computer engineer. Pretty standard fair now, but a romantic dream then. The closest I got was designing a microprocessor (OK, mostly helping my child-savent partner design it) at Indiana to test something called Lucksevitch (I can't spell it anymore) logic which could be used powerfully in analog processors. It was made into a real, live microchip. *deep bow* Now I have an MA in Computes and English Studies, after a traditional English and Philosophy education, and I'm still working on the Ph.D. while engineering knowledge building environments. It seems like it's coming around again. No direct interaction with silicon, but I'm willing to make an adult comprimise.

Darren Cambridge {d.cambridge@mail.utexas.edu}

When I was 7 or 8, I never really understood why people laughed when I said that someday I wanted to be a writer who lived on a pony ranch -- and a tightrope walker.

Looking at it now, it looks like a lot of my childhood likes (books, horses, sequins) summed up into one complex career. The time management of it alone would boggle me now.

I can't say I'm anywhere near it now, but then again I don't feel like I'm "grown up." I'm a college student, and I still don't feel as though I'm living in the real world, though perhaps I'm closer than I've been. At any rate, I gave up horseback riding, and I didn't major in anything that would necessarily lend itself to a career as a writer.

Oddly enough, it's the tightrope walker I feel closest to right now. Not in the physical sense -- though I threatened to run away and join the circus a hundred times as a kid, I never went through with it. But in the abstract sense of walking a fine line, be it between two decisions, or states of being... baby I'm there.

IPA {inpassingorg@yahoo.com}

i just wanted to wear those cool perfect round, john lennon glasses that my older cousin would wear when he visited us. up to now i couldn't tell what he did then, but i thought maybe he was writer. he never ran out of books.

and so two decades hence and i'm now a bespectacled writer -- except that i'm not really writing about the things i want to write about, and i've leared that circle frames don't much flatter my thin angular face.

the stones say it best: you can't always get what you want!

alt-man {alternativeman@music.com}

I wanted to be a writer for twelve whole years until I discovered science.

when I was old enough to talk but not yet old enough to type, my dad would transcribe my stories from babble to typewritten proof of my embryonic writing abilities. we spent many hours happily banging out stories together.

my mother kept them, and now I have them sitting on my bookshelf, bound into hardcover and illustrated mostly in red crayon. they are a source of great embarassment for me now, because a disproportionate number of those stories are about little creatures who get flushed down the toilet. I was always the one who pulled the handle. maybe I had a bit of a god complex when I was a toddler.

rabi

i wanted to be an opera-singing ballerina.

at the age of 4 i would prance around the house on my tip toes and pirouette in my socks, singing in the best operatic voice my vocal cords could muster.

but then my father was horrified to see this artistic streak in his daughter and he focused on helping me see the error of my ways.

so, after a frustrating lifetime of trying to succeed in "sensible" corporate careers that haven't nourished my soul, I'm back to square one at the age of 32 and am reclaiming the dream of "what I want to be when i grow up".

my search for the spirit of the opera-singing ballerina has begun.

divinia {divinia@altavista.com}

I think I wanted to be a 'pilot' or 'steward' first. Air travel was so glamorous back in the 60s. It would probably have been more natural for me to want to be a stewardess, but I thought serving food and drinks wasn't my thing and I was definitely not going to wear a silly skirt and hat.

'Actress' would have been the choice after that. 'Famous' too.

I think 'writer' and 'journalist' from the age of 9 and on. Something in 'broadcasting'.

All through secondary school it was 'gym teacher' because I discovered how good I was at sports.

But back to 'journalist' when I graduated.

Unfortunately, the college of journalism was swamped every year and they would do a lottery thing to accept people. I didn't get in, so I picked up a teacher training course.

I did that for 6 years and never got my degree.

prolific

As far back as I can remember, every career that ever lassoed my attention had to do with the arts. I've been drawing since I could hold a pen, and I like to say I'm pretty good at it. For the first 13 years I was pretty set on being an artist. What kind? That probably changed day by day. In high school, my attention refocused, this time on writing. For a good year or two, I was sure that someday I'd be banging out stories for some prestigious magazine.

I'd had computers of all sorts since my dad brought one home from work around the time I was 7, and sometime during my word famous writer phase I found my way online. For a short time between 8th grade and the middle of high school I was interested in being the man behind the curtain, sys admin stype stuff. One of my oldest friends changed that without even knowing it, though. A few days into my new life online, said friend asked me to check out her website, which she made after buying a book on HTML.

That was it. I was sucked in. I found a few tutorials on HTML that very night and had my first primitive web page by the next morning. I still remember exactly what it looked like. There were few blips out me, the bright yellow Nirvana smiley face and a big spinning Metallica logo. Over the next few years I kept learning as much as I could about the web, and now it seems that everything, art, writing, computers, have all come together into one job that I love. I'm working towards my computer science degree in college, was recently hired as the web designer for an internet startup, and I'm loving every minute.

Tom {tom@w3wd.com}