Prelude: A 1981 Christmas Miracle
My Dad liked to get the same Christmas gift for my step-brothers and me each year. Sometimes even my sister got the same gift. In 1981 that gift was an Atari 2600 game system. More than any gift before, "the Atari" occupied my mind at all hours of the day. It seemed like there was no limit to the games that you could play on this thing and every time I would go to the mall or a department store, the first order of business would be to check for any new game releases...
1983: And so it begins.
In the winter of 1983, I had discovered a pair of Apple II Plus computers in the classroom of one of the seventh grade math teachers at my school. Each had two Disk II floppy drives and a monochrome (green) Apple III monitor. This was my very first experience with a computer and so I suppose I owe my lifelong love of computers to Lemonade Stand and Oregon Trail; the two games I remember playing on them. To anyone born after about 1985, these will undoubtedly look very simplistic (and they were) but you have to remember that nothing like this had ever existed before.
1983: So now what? Now I wanted a computer of my own. I'd have to ask for one for Christmas as, of course, I had no money. I wasn't even sure if this would be one of those Christmas presents that would be out of reach. After all, I had been asking for a mini-bike or a go-cart for years. By summer of 1983, I was aware that Commodore (Vic-20 and C64) and Atari (400/800) existed in addition to the Apple II. I also remember seeing a lot of adds for the Texas Instruments TI/99-4a...
Each year, my Dad and Step-Mom who owned a Western Auto Store, would give each of us a Western Auto Christmas catalog so that we could circle what we wanted. The first few years, we circled nearly everything, but we soon learned that, if we limited the number of things we circled, it increased the chances we might get what we really wanted. In 1983, Western Auto was selling Atari Computers. I think you can see what's coming.
Much like the mini-bike that I asked for every year, none of us thought a computer had a chance of showing up under the tree. To be honest, I don't even remember circling one in the Christmas flyer. But there it was, under the tree. And so began an obsession that continues to this day. That computer is still with me and still connected - and still used regularly.
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