I've always been someone who needs to understand what's underneath things.

I think that started early. Sitting in my grandpa's chair, watching How It's Made or Animal Planet—shows about process, systems, cause and effect. I'd watch movies like Indiana Jones and fixate less on the adventure and more on the structures: how ancient civilizations built things that still held up. How did they do it? That question stuck.

I didn't just want to know how things worked. I wanted to make them work.

Play was never passive for me. I built with Legos until the thing in my head existed. I made little movies with toys and had to problem-solve my way through each scene. I disappeared into video games—exploring worlds, learning how simple rules could produce complex outcomes.

Technology gave that impulse a place to land. My first real exposure came from my other grandpa, who put me in front of a terminal and taught me how to make text-based games in the command line. Later, it was customizing MySpace pages for friends. Somewhere in there, building shifted from something I did for myself into something I did for other people.

I'm the oldest sibling. Growing up, that meant stepping in when things were unclear—figuring out the next move, carrying weight so someone else didn't have to. Helping people feel capable, even when things were hard. Once I started building for others, I found a natural home in roles centered on support and enablement.

That pattern has followed me everywhere. On teams, I tend to orient toward the gaps: the friction that slows people down, the complexity that blocks momentum, the missing tools that make work harder than it needs to be. I'm comfortable sitting in ambiguity, then translating it into something usable. Over time, that's also meant developing a point of view—knowing when to simplify, when to invest, and when to leave things alone.

Some of what I build is deeply practical. Some of it is just curiosity—following questions, testing ideas, seeing what happens. Most of the time, it's both.

The tools have changed over time. Now it's design and engineering. But the core of who I am hasn't shifted much. I'm someone who learns by building, who clarifies by making, and who finds meaning in helping others move forward. That tendency to step in has shaped me, for better and for worse.