I read somewhere that people change careers from 5 to 7 times in their lifetime. For me, I am unsure how to count the various things I've done. As a very young man I did the typical (for the day) yard work, babysitting, and odd chores for neighbors that included a little house painting, fixing the back steps and rail, and a few other odds and ends.
Later, what I consider to be my first 'official job', I started out working as a 'stock boy' at a women's shoe store. Owing in part to the owner insisting that I always dress as a 'proper gentleman', one day we were short staffed on the floor and I was asked to come out and help a little. I sold high book that day... and for the next few months.
Thanks to an unexpected summer in Alaska, I became very much addicted to photography. On my return to Vegas, I worked for a little while in a color lab and photo studio.
School took over my life for a while. Theater arts, Madrigal Choir, Welding and Machine Shop. Then I got lucky made my way into a new vocational school into their data processing, business organization and management programs. That was when computers took over my life.
Forty-five years later, I was still working with customers in everything from operations, programming, systems analysis, program analysis, consulting, and so much more. Ten years in with more than two dozen computer languages and untold operating systems under my belt, I hung out my own shingle... in Alaska.
Thirty-five years in Alaska running my own consultant business, a marriage with two kids, having built (mostly my labor) two houses, and dreams as yet unrealized... LIFE decided it was time for a serious change.
Now I find myself in Australia, married to a wonderful lady that is incredibly supportive of my dreams. As a new author with four manuscripts published and more on the way, I have time for my writing the way I have always dreamed, time for my photography (though it is still a bit 'back burner-ish'), and time to enjoy my storytelling.
So... I ask... with all the various industries I worked in and with as a consultant, an upholstery shop in my 'high school days', working as the driver and furniture repair and part time warehouse manager for a furniture company, women's shoes, being my own personal lumberjack for most of my life in Alaska, homes built, the crazy number of 'hats' I could wear in a single day as a consultant, division director for a company bringing military tech down to the private sector, board of directors for a small portable power company, the wildly varied things I've done through my life... and now as a celebrant... just how many careers have I had?
I figure I've either completely lost count, or the answer is 'none' because I still can't settle on anything I want to do when I grow up.
This is my first post to my Celebrant's website... the rest, I'm pretty sure, will be related to marriage and the celebrations of such. Thank you.
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