Hey, I'm Chris!

Nice to meet you! 👋

The Gist

I'm a software engineer and musician from Boulder, Colorado. 🏔️ I have been hacking and musicing for pretty much most of my life! I'm 33 years old and wrangled my first lines of HTML, CSS, and JavaScript on Neopets.com 25 years ago.

I'm an avid learner and maker! I bounce between reading, writing, learning new instruments, and composing. There's always something new to try!

Coding Origin Story

I've loved tech since I was a kid. My mom has this story she is embarrased to tell — When I was 5, I was so hooked on computers that my dad helped me bring our Compaq desktop with us on a beach vaction to Galveston.

There's always been so much to explore and make in the tech space. I grew up making custom web profiles, hacking a Nintendo DS to download a midi synth, and hosting my creative projects on my first ever website: moomoofilms.com.

I love community and teaching. My career began with teaching music to middle and high schoolers. I found immense fulfillment in helping students break down road blocks and solve problems creatively. When I can, I'm happy to help a colleague or friend get unblocked from a technical challenge.

My journey into software as a profession was interesting. I eventually found myself working on websites for my teaching projects and musical groups just about as much as I was giving music lessons. For a while, working in software full time was one of those "Unthought Knowns." After a particular "A-ha" afternoon, I commited myself to teaching myself modern web development in 2019.

I've been developing full time as of 2021. It's been a blast!

You can visit my blog to keep up with my technical writing.

Music

I've been musicing since I was a kid. I started off on saxophone in middle school. I took all the music classes I could and dabbled in writing. My biggest influences have been video game soundtracks, early jazz, and classical music.

I ended up going to college for music! Some of the best years of my life! I went to UNT for a bachelor's in music ed 🦅 and UT for a master's in performance. 🤘

I write music to tell stories and create atmospheres. Mostly light hearted and playful, I use writing as a means to capture what I love — other music, people, or moments in time.

You can listen to my music here. I also share snippets on my blog .

Philosophy

I believe we all have our own inner Truths that resonate with what we find Beautiful in the world around us. Creating is the richest way for us to align with those Truths. A life regularly entangled with creation is one in which we are in a process of Becoming, where we are practicing the spirit-lifting experience of Awe, and where we share an artifact that can inspire others to do the same.

I don't inherently think that a Mozart Sonata is in greater alignment with Truth than a teenager's home-recorded grunge song. Hence, the breadth of genre and subject matter here. Resonance and sincerity are the key ingredients.

Similarly, a seemingly logical discipline like software has its own beauty to it. The series of notes that comprise the major scale, which lay a foundation for Western music, is at its core, a wonderfully balanced relationship of frequencies with mathematical ratios that determine which tones resonate and sing in harmony. Programmers largely aspire to a similar level of order and elegance.

I use the blog especially as an open notebook of my own process for the work I do across disciplines, annotated frequently with nuggets of insight that could be useful for anyone else's work. Thanks for spending a bit of time here!

Life

I live in Boulder, Colorado with my fiancée and our pup Lucy. We all love the food here. 👌

I have a few hobbies. I fling myself against bouldering walls pretty regularly. I read. Tons! Lots of non-fiction, with sprinkles of Terry Pratchett novels and illustrative essays.

Lately I've been drawing in my spare time. I keep my blog updated with sketches and learning materials.