My name is either Thore Christer Swartz or Christer Thore Swartz, depending on what document you're looking at. My birth-certificate says the former while my driver's license says the latter, so my true identity remains in question. I find it somewhat significant and a bit eerie that I have both a Christian and Pagan name; Thore being a derivative of "Thor" and Christer being a derivative of "Christ". With such a juxtaposition of polar opposites existing in one name it's perhaps appropriate that my last name "Swartz" is a derivative of the Swedish and German word for darkness ...

I was born in Stockholm, Sweden in February of 1964. When my parents decided to move to the United States in 1967 I decided to join them, at the age of 3. We spent most of the subsequent years in California, with a 2-year stint in Chicago. I graduated from San Jose State University in 1987 with an Bachelor of Arts degree in Philosophy. (I was only in Philosophy for the money). After that I moved back to Sweden and worked for a government-run institution caring for autistic children for half a year. I then meandered through Europe and the Middle East for a while before returning to California in 1989 to begin my bright career in computer Internetworking at the then-small startup company, Cisco Systems.

I spent 9 years working at Cisco, taking part in it's evolution from a small startup company to the behemoth that it is today. Throughout that time I honed my data-networking skills to a refined art and often feel downright Gnostic when I consider the fact that this black magic called Internetworking controls an ever-increasing part of the world like some self-replicating global silicon cerebrum enticing people into it's world-wide web, and I can control it at will. Sort of a David & Goliath complex. I go by the moniker "Network Architect" when describing what I do. Like the Masons' Great Architect of the Universe, I design the inter-connections between the web of digital neurons that span the planet forming the emerging global consciousness. That sounds pretentious, I realize, but it sounds more cool than saying "I build networks".

After nine years working for the Cisco hive I decided to move on to other frontiers. Therefore, in the beginning of 1998 I seceeded from the Cisco collective and headed for the tropics. I now live on the island of Bermuda, a small rocky outcropping deep in the Atlantic ocean. I still do what I did at Cisco - design networks - but now I do it in the Bermuda Triangle. Now when a design doesn't work I can blame it on the UFOs that frequent the area.

On my spare time, assuming I have any, I draw. This I do both in traditional and digital forms. Drawing cleanses the mind and I don't get to do enough of it. I also spend time doing 3D computer-animations. I also look at my rock-climbing gear a lot and remember using it a lot more 7 years ago before I became a nerd, but I try to climb when the opportunity arises. I also hike (having done Half Dome in Yosemite and Ayer's Rock in Australia last year), scuba dive (having dived at the Great Barrier Reef last year), and whitewater river-raft (having done the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon 2 years ago). One day I will climb in Antarctica.

After graduating with my money-making degree in Philosphy I decided to continue in my idealistic search for the Truth by delving into the study of Religion. I did this by pursuing a Masters of Theology degree at Fuller Seminary, enrolling in 1990. This was an extension of my obsession with ideas that I'd begun as an undergraduate. I really did intend to finish, but I wound up becoming distracted by the inconvenient necessity of making a living, and gradually took less and less classes, until I eventually stopped around 1996. Thus I am still officially on the books as enrolled, but am really a dropout from the Truth. Perhaps one day I'll pick it up again, when I can afford to spend more time searching through the depths of the soul. I have written numerous tomes during my time there and love nothing more than debating scholastic theology and it's history, but as Lao Tzu once said, "The child plays, the adult works, and the old man returns to the freedom of the child by cultivating his spiritual garden". (Or something to that effect). Perhaps one day I'll update this paragraph with the announcement that I've been hooded.

My one big goal in life is to meet Henny Youngman.

(Addendum March, 1998: Now that Henny has passed away I guess I've failed in my life's goal, since I never got to meet the master...)