A Stab at " Off The Sprue" for Us.

Thanks, Tank-builder.

Of late, I have been working with one of my state's agencies (the one which's tasked  with assisting the disabled to find employment) and surprisingly, they've been helpful.  I say surprisingly because in 2008 and 2009, they were more focused on getting me to watch a clientel-based testimonial video before they'd help me, and when I had  the guts to say that the wasted 50 minutes that I would watch the video would be better  spent working with a counselor finding a job, they informed me I had PTSD.

This time out though, they have agreed to buy me a iPad which  has a type to speak capability and a smartphone, and to  pay to upgrade my wardrobe and they've hired a resume-writing service to rewrite my  resume.  For the first time since 2008, I have real hope that I will go back to work.

Don Stauffer

My dream job was to be an astronaut (even though the term had not yet been invented).  My heros were Yeager, Everest, Kinchlowe, and X-plane pilots.  But other heros were the guys that built research rockets and spacecraft- Goddard, von Braun (I got to meet him one day) and JPL founders.  Air Force convinced me I could not fly an airplane well enough to be a test pilot so I left AF and decided to go into aerospace industry.  It was my second best dream job and I ended up loving it. If I had to do life over again I'd do the same thing.

 

 

Hi,

I don't know if I ever had a dream job, but I guess I'm pretty happy with how things turned out for me. 

Long story short. I came down with acute appendicitis senior year of high school and missed two weeks (It would have actually been three, but since one of the weeks was spring break I got to spend that recuperating as well).

Anyway, after spending a few years at a local college (UT Arlington) I manged to find out about a school that taught only Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering that I was lucky enough to get into, though none of the credits transferred (since it was such a small school all students took pretty much the exact same course - with the possible exception of one or two electives). 

I managed to slog it out through all four years and graduate, eventhough, while I actually like ships, I don't actually like the water and never learned to swim, and tend to feel very uncomfortable in and around the wet stuff.

Since then, I've worked steadily in the Nav Arch field. Overall at times I have really enjoyed some of the work that I have done, but at other times, some of the work feels just like "something to do to pay the bills".  

The biggest issue that I have had in my chosen field is that I find that I have little control over what I eventually end up working on.  Some of the programs have been enjoyable, while others have more left me feeling "well we need someone to do this particular project and your available, so do what you can with it", or that I'm just filling the role of a tiny cog in a much bigger machine, and no matter how much time I spend on something there may be omeone higher up than me that may throw everything out that I did, because he or she believes that they have a better idea.

In the end it may not be my dream job, but overall I am happy that things worked out the way they did.

Pat

PS.  Edited to shorten the text a bit

About ten years into my 25 year Navy career, I realized I was doing just exactly what I said I wanted to do, back in the 5th grade days of reading about Midway.
Then, after retiring from the Navy I got a job with a big company and after ten years or so, I realized I was doing just what I had said I wanted for a career when I was in high school.  IT Operations matched my dream of 'working with computers' just perfectly.

Now that I have retired from the second career after 2o tears, I guess I culdn't have done any better than hitting my two dream jobs.

Rick

For me it was being an architech.  Well that went away in '72 when the college I chose couldn't transfer credits I had gotten in a semester system to a trimester system.  Quit rather that take those classes over, ended up in the USAF (rather than hip deep, slogging through a rice paddy).  Started fooling around in auto body while in South Carolina at my last duty station when my Mustang got shortened by a foot.

When I got out I went to a Community College in auto body.  Lost interest and lack of jobs got me into floorcovering sales and some installations.  Did that for 5 years until we sold the store, and back to body/paint work.  Spent over 2 years painting motorhomes (not in your worst nightmare a dream job).  Got hurt on the job, and 2 years later got a job at a small mom/pop shop, was there for over 12 years until he retired.  Stayed with another independant owner for 9 years until he sold in 2016 and stayed with the new owners and still here.

The last three employers have been the greatest people I've ever had the pleasure of knowing.  Thay all have stuck through my health isses and made accomadations for me, as well as giving me time off to go to advisory council meetings several times a year, that take 3-4 days at a time.  Have been on that council since 2003.

Getting to the point of hanging it up but still sticking with it, but the enjoyment is mostly gone since all the computerization of vehicles and the hoops you have to jump through with it.

TB, let me tell ya a litle story of someone who is continuing to seek his dream job.

When I was little I wanted to be an IST, not an ER or IAN. Ya know scientest, meteorologist, planetologist, or even like GM an airline pilot....but I became an ER and IAN. Worker, driver, builder, technician...

Before I graduated high school I wanted to and was accepted by, a school for drafting archetector, at the last moment I went to aircraft mechanics school. So here I sit with and A&P license in my wallet. I loved aircraft mechanics but what happend? 1983. Bad economic times, couldn't find a job, so I joined the Coast Guard and thought, electronics is the way to go, so that's what I did, and electronics technicIAN. I was hired by HP for more that I was making in the CG, so I got out after 14 years (we won't talk about that mistake) and started working for HP in 1997. 9/11/01 what happened? Well the bottom fell out of the electronics industry as well as others, that's what happend, so I bacame a contractOR. Found out things were doing pretty well here in Boise so we moved up from California to here, to build in 2005. 2006...what happened again? the housing crash as well as other things. Now what? I'll guess I learn how to drive a truck. A guy's gotta keep a roof over his family's head, yes? So I became a truck drivER. after over 5 years of that, I finally was able to find a job and stay at home with a terrible job constructing locomotives as an electricIAN. I finally was able to hook up with a temp agancy and get a job with HP again. Then oops, life is funny anit it? lung transplant! Now after all that, I'm right back to a contractor at HP again. I apperciate the job but it's not my dream job by any streach and it's tenuous at best. Furloughs, holidays off without pay, yeda yeda. I will be going to school soon to get a real estate license...a realiTOR. We'll see, I guess a TOR is closer to an IST, yes?? Maybe not.

When I was little I wanted to be a commercial airline pilot and travel the world. In the day the "Pan Am Captain" was the guy who had the biggest house on the block and had weeks at a time off.

My father, who was a slipstick jockey for one airline for his entire career, didn't have a really high regard for pilots because he had to fix the stuff they broke. He was pretty set against it, called it a glorified bus driver job and characterized the job as a lifetime of boredom punctuated by several minutes of sheer terror. My parents had a way of trampling on my dreams sometimes.

Then, in high school, because I had built a lot of models up to that point, I really wanted to work for an architectural model maker. My fatheer got me an interview with a friend of his who owned a model making company, but I guess he didn't see much in me.

I didn't get drafted.

During summers while in college I ran my own small contracting business. That was nice, but didn't lead to much.

I worked 20 years for a number of Architecture, Architectural Engineering and Construction companies. I liked it but I didn't have the design chops to be one of the fair haired boys.

For the last 20 years we've owned a business that specializes in a niche of Industrial Design. I suppose I wish I'd started off in ID as I like it.

These days I work 75% and do a fair amount of volunteer work. I'm one of those folks who figure to never quit working.

I used to dream about being a maritimer because I love the ocean, but I've learned enough about it to realize I don't have the temperment for it.

Bill

John !

     While I lived in Northern Ca. I did two jobs under Contract to a studio that was under contract to them I think. I don't know if they ever saw my work. Who knows? Nice part of it was I got a lot of requests for Musum Grade Restorations after that!

     Mostly cased sailing Ships ,but two for a Travel group!

Oh Well !

       I never got to work on stuff like that. After 1982 and the Tornados swept Arkansas I had to actually work for someone else again. Viola! Little Rock Airmotive- they did Falcon Jet conversions for the Planes Fed-Ex were flying V.I.P. units and the first Coast Guard planes. I worked in the shop that built the Instrument panels and electronics racks.

 Got to fly some too. From Orly to Little Rock. Oh! and Back to Orly for Delivery to the clients. I didn't realize till later what a dream job it had been !

My dream job was to be an astronaut (even though the term had not yet been invented).  My heros were Yeager, Everest, Kinchlowe, and X-plane pilots.  But other heros were the guys that built research rockets and spacecraft- Goddard, von Braun (I got to meet him one day) and JPL founders.  Air Force convinced me I could not fly an airplane well enough to be a test pilot so I left AF and decided to go into aerospace industry.  It was my second best dream job and I ended up loving it. If I had to do life over again I'd do the same thing.

Turns out, my dream job is a hydraulics design engineer.  Got away from hydraulics for a couple of hard years and getting back into it this year was like coming home.  Yep, total nerd.  My all time dream job would be a model maker for Industrial Lights and Magic, but that remains a dream.  

John

Oh, So True P.T Consulting .

      Having my Chest cracked, it's been a long road back. Not like you of course . It's all in the mind they say. Yours is pretty sharp for sure !

I got to do my dream job. I owned a vintage car restoration shop specializing in pre 1970 stuff.

Started it from nothing, built it up & sold the business 12 yrs later. What started as a hobby morphed into a solid career. I feel fortunate that I was able to do it and it never felt like a job!