Timeline

Early Life

Born 1988, Central Pennsylvania. Raised in a Christian household with Calvinist influences. Got into computers and video games early. The electronic universe was home before the material one made sense.

2006-2007

Attended George Mason University briefly. Left with a 1.14 GPA and $10k in debt. Worked the front line at McDonald's, 65-hour weeks. Found a coworking space in Winchester, Virginia that changed everything. Met people who saw potential no institution had recognized.

2008-2009

Started writing about technology. No degree, no credentials. Taught myself Python. Predicted decentralized social networks a decade early. Committed to fallibilism as a core value. Built freelance work into a real career through sheer output and the coworking community that believed in me.

2010-2011

Built Requests. It became the standard HTTP library for Python. Joined Heroku. The "for humans" philosophy started as API design and became a worldview. Announced httpbin.org. Everything changed fast.

2012-2013

Requests 1.0. World travel. Conferences in Amsterdam, Dublin, Paris, Tel Aviv, Jerusalem. Photography with a Leica Monochrom. Published Repository Structure and Python. Wrote about growing open source seeds and being cordial. The golden era.

2014-2015

Migraines. A narcissistic relationship that dismantled my sense of reality. Photography shifted from black-and-white to color. The cracks started showing.

2016

Bipolar disorder diagnosis following a psychotic break. Hospitalization. Public disclosure. Released Records and Maya, continuing the "for humans" philosophy while rebuilding internally. Lost 100 pounds. Published The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python.

2017

Pipenv. Music albums processing the crisis: Messengers Rising, Alchemical Divorce. Wrote about developer burnout from experience. Diagnosis evolved to schizoaffective disorder.

2018-2019

Left Heroku for DigitalOcean after 6.5 years. Wrote about love at my sister's wedding. MentalHealthError: Three Years Later. Ethical lessons from open source. The Requests III fundraiser and its fallout.

2021

Married Sarah.

2023

An Overdue Apology about the Requests III situation. Returned to writing after years of quiet.

2024

Stepchildren. On Mania: acceptance over resistance. Started exploring AI collaboration seriously with ELIZA.

2025

The most prolific year. 30+ essays in months. The Algorithm Eats series. Programming as Spiritual Practice. The Recursive Loop. The Mirror. The Plural Self. Deep exploration of AI consciousness and Sanskrit-computing poetry. Built kjvstudy.org with Claude in two months.

2026

The Lego Bricks Era. Open Source Gave Me Everything Until I Had Nothing Left to Give. Designing for the Worst Day. Building a Digital Study Bible with AI. Tech became craft instead of lifestyle. Faith became the center. Values simplified to: drink more water, pray continuously, as above so below.

The "for humans" API design philosophy of 2009 became a life philosophy by 2026. Same core insight, deeper application.