Career Choices, Part One

Like most kids—and many young adults too, I suppose—my answer to, "What do you want to be when you grow up?" changed several times as the years progressed.

Initially I wanted to be an artist. My mom was an interior designer, my dad an architect, and our home was filled with art and art books. I sort of came upon it naturally.

But surprisingly, when my mom caught wind of it, she put the kibosh down on that idea hard. "You'll never make any money!" In all fairness, she did actively encourage art as an avocation or a hobby, but most certainly not as my main means of income.

So I took it up as simply an outlet for my creativity, giving up all dreams of ever getting good enough to make it my career. I started out attempting to paint the sci-fi visions that were dancing in my head as a teenager, something that was put into high gear with the release of STAR WARS in 1977. I was initially inspired by the work of Chesley Bonestell and Robert McCall (my parents taking me to a show of his at the Phoenix Art Museum). It wasn't until I saw this…

…a painting by Adolf Schaller at the University of Arizona Flandrau Planetarium shortly after I started school that I was in abject awe—simultaneously realizing I wanted to be that good and knowing I never would.

But I kept painting as time allowed. You can see most of my work here.

I had a brief period in grade school when I wanted to enter the medical profession. Of course my mother was thrilled at the thought of that. I devoured  every anatomy atlas I could get my hands on. I built the entire series of the plastic Revell "Visible" models (my folks gave me The Visible Head as a birthday gift in 4th grade), including many others not produced by Revell.

And then as quickly as my interest piqued, it waned, and I took up a new passion: astronomy.

Two telescopes, more books, and some rudimentary astrophotography later, astronomy was it. I was going to become an astronomer. I'd go to Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff and get my degree.

And then the reality of the situation hit me. I learned how much math was going to be required of me and I knew based upon my own experience with math that I would never make it through. I barely passed high school algebra, and needed tutoring to get through trigonometry.

My next passion? Architecture; specifically, residential architecture.

My dad kept telling me to choose another career.

Undeterred, I kept at that one. I worked a couple summers for him during high school producing architectural drawings and also designed numerous homes on my own. (And we're not just talking floor plans and elevations. Having access to the entire Hallcraft Homes plan directory via my dad, I learned how houses went together—and coupled with the fortunate circumstance of living in a new, ever-expanding subdivision where building went on for the majority of my high school years I got to see first hand how the drawings related to the actual construction itself, and I produced entire sets of building documents for each of the houses that obsessed me…just for the hell of it.

(Oh, how I wish I still had all that work!)

Since astronomy was now out of the picture, that left architecture. Architectural school boiled down to two choices for me since I wanted to remain in-state for financial reasons: Arizona State, and the University of Arizona. Ultimately it all came down to the math. Again.

ASU required Calculus the first year. UofA did not. While ASU would've allowed me to continue living at home, UofA afforded me a degree of freedom away from home that all 18-year-olds crave—not to mention providing me the opportunity to finally come out as a gay man at a safe distance from my family.

Unfortunately, even though I graduated in the top 10% of my class, college courses—and life—were a shock. In addition, coming out during my second semester at school presented its own challenges.

I failed to pass College Algebra, necessitating a summer school glass at a local community college before I could continue on to Year Two.

My second year at the university went no better. After failing to pass Structural Engineering and barely eeking out a passing grade in History of Western Civilization, at the end of the fall semester, I quit.

I returned home and that spring started taking general courses at the community college while trying to figure out exactly what it was I wanted to do with my life. At the time I also started working as a salesgirl at Broadway Southwest.

Money was tight. While I was still living at home, between car payments, gas, insurance, paying against a loan on a very expensive turntable, and ancillary expenditures, I was coming up short. Shortly after the fall semester began, I knew I needed a job that paid more than the Housewares Department at Broadway Southwest.

I knew I had the skills and knowledge to get a job doing architectural drafting, so on a whim, I responded to a help wanted ad from an architectural firm in town. I took in examples of my work, and quite surprisingly, I was offered a job.

There was one catch; I had to quit school as this was a full-time position.

And with that—to the absolute horror of my parents—I became a college dropout. launching myself on a career that would continue for the next twenty years.

(To be continued.)