About

Nathaniel Ivry 🇸🇪

The Long Way Around

I spent my 20s and 30s training to become a commercial pilot. I earned my ATPL and CFA and learned what it means to operate inside safety-critical systems where mistakes compound quickly.

At 35, recurring kidney stones ended my medical certification — and with it, my entire career.

After the loss, I rebuilt.

I installed Arch Linux, picked up Brian Kernighan (UNIX: A History and a Memoir), and started learning how computers actually work.

A web-focused bootcamp didn't click. HTML and CSS felt like the surface of something much deeper.

Then I found CS50.

That's where I realized programming isn't about writing code — it's about designing systems, reasoning about constraints, and making trade-offs under pressure.

When I finally solved Tideman after two weeks of failure, I knew I wasn't just learning syntax. I was doing systems thinking, connecting the dots. I was having fun.

Why Backend Engineering Fits Me

Aviation Trained Me for Operations

Flying is systems responsibility in real time: checklists, redundancy, failure modes, and calm decision-making when things don't go as planned. Backend engineering felt familiar immediately — designing systems that handle failure gracefully, thinking through edge cases, and building for reliability under real-world constraints.

Distributed Systems Felt Like Home

I grew up on IRC, Usenet, and early online communities. My first computer (well, my father's) was an LC475 that I was very upset with because it could not play my friends' games. Still, I watched in awe as he navigated a network that was very new at the time, and as I grew to understand programming more, I realized that even today in 2026, the network is still fascinating. I want to program in it.

Rebuilding Taught Me Resilience

Learning to program while managing chronic pain taught me the power of routine. I had it before to even become a pilot, but doing it while under duress and pain really showed me how fixing one thing every day can add up to a mountain.

How I Think

I respect frontend specialists and UI craftsmanship deeply. As a matter of fact, I'd love to be good at it someday. My strength is elsewhere: backend systems, automation, and operational reliability.

Programs solve a problem for someone somewhere, and computers are always ultimately an extension of our own thinking. If I care about the problem deeply, my solution will be a good one.

What I Build and Operate

  • Backend services and APIs
  • Distributed and concurrent systems
  • Automation tooling and scripts
  • Production deployments and environments
  • Systems that fail predictably and recover cleanly

Tools & Stack

Primary:
Go (concurrency & systems)
Python (data & automation)
Ruby (expressiveness & CLI tools)
Bash (glue & ops)
Podman (containers & reproducibility)

Actively Learning:
Distributed systems theory
Service orchestration
Observability and reliability patterns
Infrastructure as code concepts

Where I'm Headed

I'm looking for junior backend engineering roles where:

  • Reliability matters
  • Curiosity is valued
  • Learning happens in production
  • Experience is measured in judgment, not years

I bring maturity, systems thinking, and respect for operational reality.

Connect

I rebuilt once. I know how to learn fast, think in systems, and keep things running when it matters.