Literary Draft
The first time I used a computer it was 1994. Back then I was a small four year old boy, standing at around three feet tall. Earlier in the year, my uncle – the older brother of my father, came to our house to visit. My uncle was different than most people, even in 1994 he realized that the personal computer was very significant. Which is amazing because back then the PC was little more than a glorified typewriter to most people – including my own father, and not the multimedia powerhouse it is today. I mean, the best videos the computers of that era could play would make videocassettes look like high definition.
After about 30 minutes of talking with my uncle, my dad was convinced that a personal computer was going to be important to my development. A weeks later we ended up going to Sears and buying a computer there – a Packard Bell Legend with a 15″ CRT monitor. It was an amazing machine with a 75MHz Pentium processor, 8MB of EDO RAM, a 1.3GB hard drive, a 1MB Cirrus Logic integrated video chip, floppy drive, and the most important component – a quad speed compact disc drive. For this Windows 3.11 powered computer, we paid nearly $2,000 for it.
The first time I saw the white box with grey trim, I was confused about what it was. Little would I know, this device would become my new favorite toy.
I would go after how you felt emotionally about the story. I would move into what impact the computer would have on you. I’m assuming you plan on working with computers for your job, or at least in a serious hobby. You could write about how it has paved the way for you. I like the details on the computer, and they make the story sound genuine. Considering your audience is a computer oriented class you gain a lot from that. But I think the real story is about you, and what impact that machine had on you. All we know about you is that you were confused, but you need to resolve that. Clearly you’re not the least bit confused about computers now. Maybe mention why that is.
I would just add a paragraph or two on top of what you have already written.
I agree with rmpease that you need a couple more paragraphs of content to flesh out this story. It reads more like a teaser of significant things to come. The question is, how did this initial purchase impact your life? Your family? What else did your family do in fostering your computer literacy? You have a lot of details already concerning the specs of your first computer. I would like to see (hear) the same level of detail when discussing more emotional anecdotes.
I am also interested in the concept of the computer as a toy. What did you do with it? Did it always hold the status of a toy for you? If not, when and how did it change? I am assuming that it did change given that you are now attending a very computer mediated university.
More. That’s what you need to give to your audience.