Hmmm… First, airline pilot. What kid didn’t. Then architect. Then mechanical engineer.
I do love everything mechanical. Took a programming class in 1979. Hated it. That was the time of punch cards. I wanted hands on stuff.
I also wanted to be an artist at about 18 years old. I was quite confused and withdrew from college.
Oddly, technology brought it together. I’m now a GIS programmer. Lots of art in cartography, much, much better ways to program, and well there is a lot of engineering involved in map making.
I never really had a plan or a dream job. I just sorta drifted along with the current, and aimed where my interests pointed me. I went to college because that’s what everyone did. I selected a major based on my interests at the time, graduated, and worked in that field (digital maps) for a few years before transitioning into something more transferrable (project management), which is what I have been doing for 20+ years now.
My career has turned-out for me to be a faceless, cubicle-dwelling (until the pandemic) corporate drone. Fortunately, it pays decent and I have been able to provide a stable life for me and my family, even if the job itself is not my passion, not related at all to my college major, but it also allowed time to pursue other interests. I now have the time and resources to travel, which is what I envisioned for myself when I was in school - to be in the field and experience things.
A bit of advice I picked-up around here some time ago: It’s not “Do what you love and the money will follow”. It should be “Do what you are good at to make money. Use the money to do what you love”.
As a kid, I had a real chemistry set, the kind they no longer sell with possibly dangerous chemicals, and I loved it. I also read every science-oriented book I could find. I did well at math, but didn’t love it. Then, after finishing HS, I got a job as a lab assistant in a research lab while pursuing part time studies. Two things happened. First, I discovered that I found lab work boring. Second, I came on two grad students talking about abstract algebra. On inquiry, I discovered what real math is and fell in love with it. This led directly to my career as a professor and research mathematician. With some success–over 100 publications. My real dream job, even if I didn’t know it.
In my personal life I know several people who worked in the financial sector for years, decided they hated it and then transitioned to something else. They might bitch about that time, but the thing is, they all, to a man, have financial freedom now. They are starting businesses while only risking a small fraction of their assets. Or own enough property that they don’t need to work any more and can just find whatever takes their fancy.
Even if they didn’t enjoy working in banking, it was the thing that enabled them to do the things that they do enjoy. It’s an option that I was not aware of in my teens at the point of needing to decide what to do.
I was always fascinated with science (but didn’t like math), and I enjoyed art (but was told that while it’s a good hobby, I’d never make any money at it).
As and adult, I ended up combining the two into a field which didn’t exist when I was a kid- VFX artist.
When I was in college, my job was planned out- get my degree in Marine biology, then a job at the Hyperion Sewage plant, where I had a “in”. 3 days working for the plant, 2 days on related independent research, a dream job for most scientists. Taking samples of the water out near the outflow, catching fish that might have issues, etc.
From the time I was a little kid until mid-adolescence I wanted to be a musician – specifically I wanted to play a guitar in a rock bad. It mattered not that I had no clue how to play any musical instrument and indeed had never even held a guitar. That’s what I wanted.
When I actually first attended college after earning a GED I wanted to be a physician. I dreamed of being a small-town doctor like Joel Fleischman in Northern Exposure. The amount of chemistry required quickly disabused me of that notion and I dropped out, not to return for 11 years.
Now at age 40 I’m a teacher in a boarding school, teaching GED classes to inner-city youth and juvenile defenders and abuse victims that have fled the foster system, all who are barely literate and have never known what a support system, guide, or mentor is.
I thought I’d be an author/artist/actress.
I turned out to be a secretary…the job I never wanted. Next lifetime I hope I get to be a mortician. Or a dog groomer. Or a psychologist.
I decided I wanted to be a lawyer for reasons which escape me. I’m now in the upper echelons of the profession in my own tiny little pond. I have little interest in law though. I’ve never had any idea what I wanted to do, and now don’t think I ever will. I’m a perpetual dabbler.
I always wanted to be a fighter pilot. I ended up being a civilian pilot, culminating in flying for an airline in the last few years. Then COVID happened. Now I’m a train controller (I believe they are called train dispatchers in the USA). Once COVID settles down a bit, I will go back to my old airline job.
When I was a kid, all I wanted to be was an architect. And I would have been a truly fine one. At college, I was at the top of my class.
But you know what often happens in college. My interests broadened, and I wound up with five majors. And at age 45, I finally became an artist (just like my parents).
My dad wrote TV comedy shows including The Honeymooners and The Flintstones. I wrote a book of interviews on the subject, with interviewees including Carl Reiner and Norman Lear.
I wanted to write light fiction (think PG Wodehouse or more weightily Evelyn Waugh).
The closest I’ve cone is writing notes to financially statements in Quarterly and Annual Reports. Contrary to popular belief, I regard that as neither fiction nor humor.
Dream job: Major league baseball play-by-play announcer
What I thought I’d do: Teacher, like my parents
What I really did: IT, first as a developer, then a network engineer, then department manager
What I do now: Not a damn thing, but I’m getting pretty good at it
Fun anecdote (well, fun to me and my friend Stormin’ Norman). He and I met at a German Bierstube in Madison one night, but he’d gotten there early and was already two pints into being best friends with a tableful of Brits when I showed up.
As I approached, one of them pointed at me and said “WHO is the MOST revered American CELEBRITY in the UK?”
“Ummm…” “Elmer Childress!”
My mouth hung open, theirs got filled with Kölsch, and we all became instant comrades.
kenobi may recognize the name… unless he’s too young, in which case, everyone can google the legend.
