A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away…

And crash landed to Earth…

Bitten by a radioactive spider…

The boss looked across the room, raised her arm and pointed. “You. You’re the new database administrator.”

As both an avid reader and fan of science fiction and fantasy, I love a good origin story. I’m sure many of you also share my passion. But why? The characters in literature and comic books and on the screen are already super: why do we idolize and analyze their creation too?

I believe that part of the answer is that many of these heroes were just ordinary people before they became super. They hadn’t gotten their powers and they hadn’t turned into rockstars. But when they changed, they changed from ordinary into extraordinary, from nothing into something – and that’s a myth that’s rooted in American history. This country is built on the belief that you can begin as the lowest of the low and work to turn yourself into a success. Fame and fortune are hanging fruit to be taken. This belief is so strong that the United States has a great many people that attempt to migrate here every year to fulfill that dream.

I think that the creation story is important for DBAs as well. It’s something on which we tend to concentrate. And the funny part is that many of our personal origin stories are similar. There are only a few among us that began our careers wanting to be database administrators, but there are a great many who have been cornered by the boss and thrust into the role.

So if there are many who share this humble beginning, why do we analyze it? Once again, I’ll draw a comparison to the American myth. Just as Carnegie and Rockefeller stand as examples of entrepreneurial industrialists that grabbed ahold of their own destinies and made something of themselves, we too need examples in our own community of excellent and accomplished DBAs. These examples allow the rest of us to emulate and learn from their successes and failures. While no two people will ever walk the same path in life, the rest of us who follow in the footsteps of giants can be assured that our forward momentum will be easier to sustain. And most importantly, when we’re struggling to succeed and we’re feeling down and out, we ony need to think of our personal-DBA-hero in order to pick ourselves up, pat the dust from our clothes, and dive into the work again. We allow ourselves to be convinced that there is always hope, that there is always the potential for change, and that we only need to grab ahold of our destiny to make it so.

Just as any little girl or boy can grow up to become the president, any one of us – no, all of us can continue to build our DBA skills and land that dream job, become leaders in the community, or become the folks that seem to know it all. And yeah: I promise that this post wasn’t paid for by Barack Obama…

Moral of the Story

Every story has a moral to share and the myth of the database administrator is no exception. One that comes to mind immediately is that hard work and sacrifice will win the day. I think that it’s obvious and can be said for any number of careers and goals, so I’ll instead borrow a central tenet from Spiderman. In that story, Peter Parker’s uncle, Ben, gave him a bit of sage advice early in the tale. He told Peter, “With great power comes great responsibility.” Soon after, Peter was presented with an opportunity and he responded amorally by removing himself from the situation. As a result, many may remember, Uncle Ben was killed by the same criminal that Peter chose to ignore.

Thankfully, we’ll never face life-or-death situations in our daily jobs, though I’m sure it feels contrary to the above often. Still, we are given a great amount of power and we are help to a great level of responsibility, and it shouldn’t be something that’s forgotten as we all strive to complete our own origin stories. We need to be acutely aware of our charges as we grab the reigns of destiny.

What are your favorite origin stories? What morals from literature and legend do you think are applicable to database administration?