Jobs: Dreams and Reality

[gojira]

Grow up?

What's that? 

[hbliam]

I wanted to come from "old money" but that didn't work out. Now I do the  thing which isn't too bad. I work 12.5 hour days but only 163 days a year. I 'm back in school now. I might end up doing something different in a few years.

[Mother]

I always dreamed of staying out of jail

so far so good

Shit this was a serious question and i find myself compelled to answer...here is my life charlie brown

I wanted to be a Marine

I got to live my dream for 18 months

From 15-18 I was on a paintball team and made money playing

We were the enemy against the local marine reserve unit (6th ESB)

it was a blast until I fell one day and fractured my knee

When I was of age the Army came and tried to convince me that being a scout was the place to be

A recruiter came to where I worked and took me to lunch, he had ketchup on his tie and a button missing

by the end of the day I was a Marine recruit

I went to MEPS and lied about my knee injury

they found out and wouldn't let me be active duty so put me in the reserve unit of my choice(nice of them)

until I got a waiver for my orthopedic

I chose the 6th because I knew them, it was in Portland, and I had listened to them for years

I wanted to be a combat engineer (1371)  "you go out and find mines"

My entire "career" was me going every weekend to the 6th ESB base on swan island or training exercises at camp rilea

They paid me and I even made PFC before the TiG date 

But that was it, it was peacetime and no need for a gimped up Marine that might be an issue if he stepped on a rock wrong

So I got to go out and find a civilian job

It is my one and only love/hate thing in my life. I am proud of my time but I do not confuse myself with being anything close to the boys and girls who had to go train for real and play in the sand box

People can give me the "Once a Marine always a Marine" but I'm sorry that just isn't true

After that I became a Millright, spent a year at Reynolds Aluminum getting the plant back online

and

a year at Umatilla Chemical Weapons Depot building the incinerator for the HG shells and VX rockets

That was so much fun I came home and became a ski tech while I did volunteer fire and had a part-time job on an ambulance

Then in 2004 I thought I grew up and became a paid fireman, then I re injured my knee and that plan died

After my time in rehab I started working for FEMA and worked Katrina, Rita, and Wilma

When that mess was over I took a full-time job on the ambulance and left in the summer for various wildland fires and worked Gustav and Ike for FEMA

Now I'm primarily work on the Ambulance and just retired my Station Manager position at the firhouse to be domesticated

I'm happy and think I will grow up sometime in the next 6 months 

[ducpainter]

I design defense systems for the military (mostly missiles). It's pays the bills, but my childhood dream of being in the FBI seems like it would be more fun. 

I looked in your profile...

so I kinda cheated...

but I knew what company you worked for before I looked.

[Vindingo]

I always wanted to be a surgeon when I was younger.  I did all of the things an over achieving kid does in order to look good to get into some fancy college.  I volunteered at hospitals, watched surgeries, followed around family friends who were doctors...    One day I was in the OR watching a pneumonectomy and the responsibility of having someones life in my hands scared the shit out of me.  I was 17 and didn't think I could handle it.  

Both of my parents are architects and my grandfather had a fairly large construction outfit.  I worked construction every summer growing up.  I liked getting tan, having rough hands and building stuff.  I decided that I couldn't swing a hammer forever so I went to architecture school.  I got my master's degree in architecture and was really high on it until I got my first job in an arch office.  It sucked, I hated almost every single client and sitting in front of a computer.  I quit the arch job and got a job in construction management.  I didn't care for that much either so I got a job designing and building custom cabinets and furniture.  I now do handyman work because people don't want to commission expensive shit.  


Last Monday I put down a confirmation deposit for a post bacc pre-med program starting this fall...  we will see what happens

[Sleeper_I]

Some days I feel exactly like this guy

Massage Therapist for Models

[jdubbs32584]

Now I'm primarily work on the Ambulance and just retired my Station Manager position at the firhouse to be domesticated

I'm happy and think I will grow up sometime in the next 6 months 

You ain't domesticated.

[Bun-bun]

When I was young, I wanted to own a pet shop (Yes, I was strange even as a child.), and my first "job" was catching tadpoles and selling them to a local pet store for 5 cents a piece (I was five.).
By age 12, I was working with wood, building tree forts, putting up shelves, etc. I graduated college with a B.S. in Biology, and a concurrent B.S. in Psychology, but couldn't find a well paying job in either field, and was burnt on school, so I started working construction.
Now I'm a master carpenter, and own my own company renovating classic houses, and if the economy doesn't improve soon, I'll be the guy asking "Do you want fries with that?"

[somegirl]

I was also an uber geek who grew up in a house that started getting the earliest consumer computers available. We still have one of these working:

We had a Heathkit computer!  And I grew up playing with punch cards.   Does that make me an uber-uber geek?

[herm]

nothing to speak of. 3rd generation fireman. best i could do was chase smoke through the timber in the western states.
no glamour, pay sucked, knees are shot.

proud of it though...

[jdubbs32584]

We had a Heathkit computer!  And I grew up playing with punch cards.   Does that make me an uber-uber geek?

Yup. Wish I got to learn more about punch cards and see them in action.

[turtherlips]

I looked in your profile...

so I kinda cheated...

but I knew what company you worked for before I looked.

I think everybody in our neck of the woods is either related to, or knows somebody that works here.

[NvrSummer]

Great topic!

I wanted to be a fireman since as long as I can remember.  I bummed around the stations in high school, and in college I volunteered for a department and received all my training and certifications free of charge.  I tested and tested and tested, but just couldn't get hired.  After college I used my degree and went to work in construction management, which I like, but I'm not passionate about.

Last week I got a call saying my name is coming up for a Chief's interview for a department I tested on over a year and a half ago.  Forgot the hiring list was even still active.  Completely caught me off guard, as I had pretty much given up on ever being a firefighter.

Now I'm stuck between pursuing it, or staying in construction where I'm doing well and advancing quickly.

Hmmm, a job vs a career, a means to an end vs a dream.  Big decision if I make it to that interview.

[herm]

take the interview. you can always turn down the job (but you wont)

[Monster Dave]

Nope. But...





Yeah...I'm afraid that you're going to have to come in on the weekend. Yeah...