What would you be if you weren't who you are?

[Nash]

Just to give the post some context of what I'm getting at:

I enrolled in university out of high school and lasted for 2 weeks then quit. I got a crap job and a crap girlfriend for a coupla years, then chucked it to head back to school. I lasted two months that time - then went back to crap jobs and crap girlfriends.

I went home one Sunday for family dinner, and Mom dumps a bag full of all these art supplies on the table. Weird stuff to me at the time. Pens... bottles of ink... paintbrushes etc. And she slaps down an application for art college and says I've got two months until the deadline... and that I have to come up with 12 pieces of art and write some essay.

Wish I coulda seen the look I gave her. WTF? I sucked at art.... never paid any attention to it, never took it in school. It was an absurd idea.

But... heh... for the next two months I came home from work and just started making stuff. Awful, horrible garbage. I can't remember what most of them were... but I remember trying to give them artistic sounding titles, because I thought that's what artists did. One was a portrait of this old woman, and I (lol) called it "Gin and Catatonic"... jesus...

k... I'll speed it up.....

I got accepted... and for the next 4 years I owned the joint. Then got accepted into the School of Visual Arts (a big deal) and spent another two there. Graduated, lived large in the Big Apple with clients like Chase Manhattan and Goldman Sachs.

Phew... So anyways...  uhm.... Life is funny. Where it takes you. If I wasn't doing this, I don't have the faintest idea what I'd be doing.

So my questions to y'all.... (because I think it's interesting)....

Did you always want to do what you're doing now? Was it a straight line?

When you were younger, did you picture yourself doing something different than what you're doing now?

How did you wind up doing what you're doing?

Any regrets? Or conversely, thoughts of "Thank god!"

Do you like what you're doing now? Or wish you were doing something different?

Do you think your occupation matters, and that you matter to your occupation?

Or does none of it matter, and that wherever you wound up is (and was) never necessarily important, when compared to other aspects of life?

If so, is that an attitude you've taken on now but didn't subscribe to when you were younger? Or always held?

[skernsk]

When I graduated I worked construction, then went to college a couple of years after high school.  Took 'Education' and lasted one semester.  

Spent the next 10 years in crappy jobs and with the wife 8 months pregnant and less than a year into a mortgage I found myself unemployed.

Desperate and stressed out I walked into a 'water and sewer' contractor and was hired for 12 bucks an hour as a laborer.  I was making 18 bucks an hour before my first paycheck and have been there ever since.  I love many things about my job .. playing on tractors and backhoes, running a crew or just laboring in the ditch all have some form of satisfaction.  The hours suck ... I have hit almost 100 hours in one week ... no I'm not kidding.

The job allows me to make enough to support the family and my wife works 2 shifts on weekends so we are actually able to raise our kids and not a babysitter.  

I envy those who know early what they want to do for a living ... I am still looking.  Maybe one day I can figure it out.......

[SunTracker]

When I was in Kindergarten, I wanted to be a scientist.  

Now I am (soon-to-be) a Junior at the University of Louisville, studying biology.

I also wanted to fly World War II airplanes since I was a very young boy.  Aces High has let me do that.

I've always wanted to have a huge aquarium, several hundred or even thousands of gallons.  I'm a scuba diver, so that dream has been fulfilled also.

All thats left is for me to move to a tropical island

[vorticon]

Originally posted by SunTracker


All thats left is for me to move to a tropical island

just let global warming take care of that...

as far as i can tell, im going to work my bellybutton off with some ****ty job till i turn 18, get on as labour crew at the road maintenance place my dad works, then im going to be a butler...

[Raubvogel]

I'm doing what I always wanted to do as a kid. Guess I got lucky.

[Nash]

Originally posted by Raubvogel
I'm doing what I always wanted to do as a kid. Guess I got lucky.

Type on the BBS? Come on Raub... fill us in.

[Octavius]

Well I'm not dead, so I must be doing something right

I want to fly - pure and simple.  In a few months I'll be plowing through hours in the air and grabbing a PPL.  

In the mean time, I'm starting a full time job at tomorrow General Mitchell International (MKE) and getting a feel for the general operations at an international airport.  At the same time, I'm studying at the University of Wisconsin for a degree in  physics. I threw mechanical engineering out the window, on the grounds that I don't like paperwork (and it would add a full two semesters to double major).  It's still up in the air, if I find the motivation, I'll do it.  Once that's taken care of, I wouldn't mind having the government pay for my flight time... so I'll be looking into the service 2-3 years down the road.

Regrets?  Too much damn time in Aces High  I haven't blown it... yet

[Steve]

I am perhaps the biggest underachiver of all time.  my regrets are too many to list here.

[RedTop]

Originally posted by Nash
...So my questions to y'all.... (because I think it's interesting)....

Did you always want to do what you're doing now? Was it a straight line?

Nope and heres the way it went....High School to Navy (Fireman) , to Golf Pro , to Where I am now.

When you were younger, did you picture yourself doing something different than what you're doing now?

Oh Yeah.  Fireman. Did it in the Navy. Took the Test when I got out and practically aced it. Unfortunately the ole Affirmative Action cost me.

How did you wind up doing what you're doing?

Got my job thru the Golf Business. I played quite a bit with the Director of where I work now. One day I told him I was tired of 70-80 hours a week for crap pay. He was playing with one of the managers (whom I knew as well) and told him to hire me the next week. SO , I walked off the course..Told my Boss at the time I quit and Left. Didnt know diddly about what I was doing , but just went with it. Now 14 years later here I am.

Any regrets? Or conversely, thoughts of "Thank god!"

Sometimes regrets and others thank god. Regrets mostly because I work nights and miss family things and all. Thanks god because I have a good boss , goood benefits and I'm making more money than I ever have. Not alot...but Enough.

Do you like what you're doing now? Or wish you were doing something different?

Fireman...or PGA Tour Pro. Had a shot one time...now I have to wait for the Senior Tour.

Do you think your occupation matters, and that you matter to your occupation?

Yep..Legislature don't function if  this computer room goes. And Yes I matter because I have learned and I'm good at what I do.

Or does none of it matter, and that wherever you wound up is (and was) never necessarily important, when compared to other aspects of life?

Being the best husband and father , Son , Uncle , Brother , and GRANDFATHER I can be is all that really matters.

If so, is that an attitude you've taken on now but didn't subscribe to when you were younger? Or always held?

As I have gotten older I have changed. Now my parents are REALLLY smart.

[Lizking]

You do not have to know where you are to be there.

[hawker238]

If I did not have to go to college and have a successful future, me and a friend wanted to walk the coast from New England to Chile to Alaska with nothing but backpacks.

[Nash]

How long have you been a Buddhist, Lizking? How did you wind up becoming one. Do you have any regrets? Do you enjoy that life?

[jEEZY]

Went to the California Culinary Academy 4 years out of high school.  Before that I travelled through a newly independant E. Europe and a previously free W. Europe.

After cooking in various joints throughout the country I went to university and graduated summa cum laude from a small liberal arts college with a major in history (thesis dealt with WWII, wont get into here but if your interested drop me a line)

Took the LSAT, was accepted to GW Law School graduated with honors.  Appointed to a position with a federal district court judge in WY.  Passed the CA bar. Looking for employment.

I would have rather been a rock star or professional gambler.  And of course given the general BBS subject an aviator,

[capt. apathy]

interesting subject to come up.  I've been wrestling with this one for a while now.

from the time I was 4 I wanted to do the marine biology thing.  do the research boat thing.  lots of diving, make some films that sort of thing.

I got my dive certs when I was 11.  I took oceanography classes at the end of elementary school and in Jr high(went to good schools then, had lots of options).  

then about a month or so before my 14th birthday my parents moved us to Missouri.  quite a ways from the nearest ocean, most of the water was a nice dirt brown with snakes in it.  the science & math classes available were about 3 years behind the schools I had gone to before.  I didn't make 1 dive for the next 7 years.

since then it wasn't a matter of what I wanted to do so much as what would pay the bills.  nothing really interested me, but I got married right out of school and had kids to feed.  I did a lot of jobs from selling fish, working in the shipyards, to running the computers and finance division for an insurance brokerage.

  I eventually ended up building and repairing boilers.  it's interesting enough, challenging, and not much 'office-politics' crap to deal with.  I'm good at it, excellent pension plan, the pay ain't bad and usually the job ends and they lay you off before you get sick of a project and quit.   there are a lot worse ways to make a living and most guys in my family end up doing it anyway.

about a year and a half ago I was injured.  aside from the neck damage (which makes it pretty much impossible to wear a welding hood again), I also received an inner-ear injury.  it completely trashes my sense of balance, situational awareness, and ability to concentrate or focus my eyes for any length of time (all of these work together to turn my normal work environment into a death-trap).  to top it all off I get seasick standing on dry ground and can only read very short bits at a time with a severely limited comprehension (went from reading 500-700 pages a week to less than 250 in recreational reading in the last 19 months).

so now at 38 years old I get to try and figure out what I want to do for the next 27 years (thats another bonus, had I been able to stay at my present job I would get full retirement at 58, now I get to work an extra 7).

I have no idea what to do now.  plus my original plans for retirement are pretty much off the table (learn to sail, move to the islands and make some spare cash doing a 'rent a dive buddy' type thing.)

I'm supposed to see some vocational counselor this month,  hope he has some ideas.

[Raubvogel]

Originally posted by Nash
Type on the BBS? Come on Raub... fill us in.

Ever since I was a little kid I always wanted to be around aviation, especially helicopters. Right out of high school I joined the Army and worked on helicopters for 5 years. Got out of the Army and worked crap jobs for 4 years before I realized that I had already figured out what I wanted to do with my life but was too stupid at the time to realize it. Went back into the Army, got my A+P license. Now I work as a contractor providing maintenance support to the National Guard. About to start a job instructing Army helicopter maintenance courses. It still amazes me sometimes when I see a helicopter torn down to an airframe, put back together, then taking off into the sky. Some people don't get it, but to me it's like a zen moment or something. I make decent money, will never be wealthy, but I thoroughly enjoy what I do and get satisfaction out of my job. That's enough for me.