re: What’s the one event or decision that changed the trajectory of your life the most?

Currently in college and got into some trouble the last 2 years with my grades by chasing women and partying my arse off. My plant baw father tells me that it’d be best if I just get a degree in instrumentation and go work in the plant. Easy and cheap degree, I’ll have a job before I graduate, and I’ll make good money where I won’t have to really struggle. So I decided I’ll do it.

In high school I never wanted to be a part of the plant life and wanted to get away from the plants and south Louisiana so I decided half way through my first semester of community college that I want to go back to a university and get a good degree there and get the hell out of here and hopefully go to Houston, Austin, or Dallas. So hopefully this decision I make to go back to my university pays off. All I know is the partying and chasing women part of my life is over and it’ll be all about making good grades and settling down with a woman (instead of hooking up with them) until I graduate.

#InB4DearFacebook

frick em in the neck, birdseed

That’s really cool. When I was in high school, 3 of my oldest closest friends decided to join the Marine Corps and audition for the band. They wanted me to enlist with them, hoping we would all make it and get to spend our tours together. I instead chose to go to LSU. It turned out only one made the band, one failed the piss test at the end of band camp, and the last one was never deployed but spent his whole time in the service on reserves. I had also flirted with going to the Naval Academy at Annapolis as I had the grades and an elected official willing to sponsor me. I do sometimes wonder how my life would have gone if I’d taken one of those routes. The final choice I had was a chance to go to Colorado School of Mines, a premier engineering school. Today, that marine who made the cut in the band now lives in Denver just a short drive from the School of Mines. 18 is often a crossroads age that can send you all over the f$&king map.

Spent three days in Ann Arbor, MI before turning the moving truck around back to Birmingham. Thought I was going to get a PhD from there but jumped ship before it started.

Led to the worst two years of my life but the past year has been rad. Can’t say for sure if this is my “so glad” or “biggest regret” moment, but life is much better for me now. Steady job I enjoy with decent salary. Networked enough to get a music gig for side income any time I want. Adjunct at a community college to satisfy that college teaching desire.

Had a baby and am on track to buy a house in two years. Kids have a college fund and we just bought our first SUV, first auto purchase since 2007.

I also avoided the painful and bullshite-ridden path of academia.

Lost 4 babies in 2 years. We were farther along as well. Kinda never recover from it

Your screen name is sta4ever. There’s like a 70% chance we’re related. If you have any older siblings, I probably went to school with them. The odds we know each other in real life are pretty damn favorable.

Realizing i am an alcoholic and sobering up

quote:

---

A plant near my house just laid off a ton of employees. This being the same plant where I worked out of HS. I started thinking about how much different my life could have been if I hadn’t made the decision to join the forces. I could have been one of those guys who had to go home to their families and tell them they’ve just been let go. I’m out now, but it’s lead to so many other opportunities. Working nights there, realizing I hated it, and the subsequent decision to join the military easily changed the entire trajectory of my life and where I was going. Everyone told me at the time how crazy I was for leaving such a great job. Anybody got a similar story, where one decision or event set you on a different path? Guess I’m just saying don’t let your dreams be dreams, baws.

---

I started out in the oil field right out of high school in 1999 and in 2002 I made a career
Change to a delivery driver making the same amount but I was home every night. I moved into a supervisor roll around 2011 and took a 20k pay cut. I did that for 3 years and at the end of three years I was still 10k less than when I was a driver. I was looking at leaving the company at the time but I took a chance at going to outside sales and have since more than tripled my salary every year for the last 5 years.

Actually, i’ve Thought more about it. While losing my eye was a huge trajectory change, there was a 6 month period in my life that changed me even more.


In that 6 months I had a son, my wife left me for someone that catfished her on the interwebs, I lost 90 lbs, then got thrown under the bus and lost my job as a plant operator, then my little brother died in a tragic accident.


That amalgam of experiences truly altered my life inorexably. It destroyed me, broke me utterly, and yet somehow I emerged on the other side a completely different man. A Phoenix from the ashes