This is from 1982. I was practically penniless when I first read this article in the Atlantic. It would be three more years before I saved enough to buy my first computer. I can remember wanting a computer so badly that I could taste it.

I CAN HARDLY BRING myself to mention the true disadvantage of computers, which is that I have become hopelessly addicted to them. To the outside world, I present myself as a man with a business need for a word-processing machine. Sure, I have a computer: I'd have a drill press if I were in the machine-tool business. This is the argument I make frequently to my wife. The truth, which she has no doubt guessed, is that I love to see them work.

via The Atlantic | July 1982 | Living With a Computer | Fallows.