Goodbye

I was thinking the other day that I have spent some time writing here about my jobs but not a lot of time writing about what I did before work entered my life. That would be back in the days of childhood, from age 4 to 10. Hmmm? I hadn't thought about that before…it's only six years. At the age of 10 or 11, I was jumping into the world of commerce by mowing lawns and delivering papers. I even went door to door as a magazine subscription salesman. Bye-bye childhood.

But what did I do for fun? As a child? Being an asthmatic, I got to spend far too much time at home and in bed. And my mother had to devise ways for me to entertain myself. One of her ideas was to give me modeling clay; the kind that never hardens and has the ability to stay locked forever within the fibers of the carpet. Great stuff! And I loved it; making armies and castles. Making automobiles and submarines. And I could merge the clay with all of my other activities; such as Tinker Toys and Erector sets.

And I loved to draw. Sketch. Doodle. Nothing ever came of it; I never became a 'famous artist'. I did have a dream of going to the Art Center and graduating from that famous school. I read everything I could about the school and I thought that would be heaven; to spend your days in class being 'artistic'. There didn't seem to be any work involved. But money was involved and so I didn't get to go. That and the fact that I wasn't able to focus on one thing long enough to become really good at it.

That probably explains why I enjoyed construction so much. I could enjoy each project because I knew that there was an end to it. I would finish and then move on to another. Never bored. In fact, the jobs that lasted over a year at the same site were dreaded. I enjoyed the size and the scope of such projects but hated the duration! Whenever a project came down to the last few weeks, I was more than ready to turn it over to someone else to finish so that I could begin another.

I thought, and still do…that working at the same job and in the same place for 30+ years would be worst possible fate that could befall a person.