They say that the average person will have 7 jobs in his life. I’m in the middle of my 3rd job, and I’m only 32. Today is officially my 4 year anniversary at The Company. Four years is the longest I’ve ever stayed anywhere, post-college. This is a rare moment in my life. The first time since college where I’m not anxious about my place in the world. To give you an idea why, I’m about to recall my past 2 jobs before this one.
After school, I found myself in a position that I’d never experienced before. I was without a goal or even an aim. I was akin to a prisoner who’d just been freed from a 16 year sentence. From the moment I’d entered school up to the last day, there were always people there who’d tell me what I needed to do and where I needed to go. All I had to do was ask. The rest was up to me. The last set of directions I got was from my folks. They told me to just go out to Dallas, because they’d heard that there was work out there for engineers. I thought to myself Dallas is as good as any other city in terms of work. That’s how my career started. I came out to Dallas. I didn’t know anyone, had no contacts and no plans short of “looking for work.” Thinking back on it, that was the most naive and frightening thing I’d ever done.
My parents even helped me purchase my first item as an adult – an SUV. Considering where I was planning to live, it was quite appropriate. It was planned that my brother would join me on my drive to Dallas to help with the drive. My brother being the adventurous type probably would’ve asked to go with me even if my parents hadn’t suggested it. I recall that I’d had all my stuff packed into a UHAUL trailer on a Sunday evening. We left exactly at midnight. I even recall having trouble backing out of my parent’s driveway with that stupid trailer. The trip was expected to take about 8 to 9 hours. With the trailer it ended up being 10 due to the speed limit when hauling a trailer. My first taste of Dallas traffic didn’t exactly help either.
The first week consisted of settling in and familiarizing myself with the urban sprawl that is Dallas. We checked out Six Flags and went to the Ballpark. Standard fare for tourists except for the fact I was going to be a permanent resident. After that first week, my brother headed back home. I was left to my own devices. That first week alone was the loneliest I’d ever spent in my life. I was isolated and didn’t know a soul in town. No one to go to for advice or even just to listen while I rant.
In ’96 there were a great need for engineers here in Dallas. I started my career at the exact right moment, and lucky enough to choose the right place. This was the start of what we would all come to know as the dot com boom. The problem for me as I soon found out was experience. Relevant experience. I had none. I came from a third tier school that didn’t provide its students with any internship programs. My grades weren’t bad, but they weren’t good either. Nothing about me on paper looked impressive. I looked like any other dumbass with a degree. As a matter of fact I look like just about every dumbass on paper. In my not so humble but personal opinion, I would say I had a lot to offer an employer. It just didn’t show.
Job hunting for me consisted of getting a local paper and just going through the want ads. Depending on the request for resumes or CV as the Europeans would call them, I’d either fax it in or email it in. Occasionally, I’d even cold call some of the bigger employers out here. Nine out of ten times, I’d get form letters informing me that my resume would be placed in their database at which time they’ll contact me when there’s an opening calling for my expertise. I didn’t have any area of expertise where I had any experience. What the form letters was saying amounted to, “Forget it, dumbass. You’re lucking we even sent you this letter telling you off.” On the occasion where the replies were not handled by automated systems, they would be requests for referrals. I would send referrals and never get replies afterwards.
This went on for a month, and it was disheartening. I decided to get out of my funk and got part time work while I was job hunting for my intended profession. I reasoned that if I have less time to to think about my situation, it would be less depressing. I worked as a computer technician and at a chain supermarket as a bagger. The computer technician position was at a small two man operation which basically built generic PC’s for just about anybody. Their main line of business was sales to small businesses. The bagger position was probably the more interesting of the two parttime jobs I had. You meet anybody and everybody, because there isn’t a person who doesn’t shop for grocery. This job gave me a taste of what major cities such as Dallas was like. I’d lived most of my life in a small town and I really didn’t have an idea what to expect living in a urban area. Here’s what I learned. People in general are the same wherever you are. Most people are just doing their best to get by without causing trouble to others. There are people whom noone can tolerate. And finally there are people who are just extremely interesting in ways beyond description.
As the second month began to drag on into the third, I was starting to doubt my abilities to find any work in the field I’d so wanted to be in. Crazy thing ran through my head. I would think, “Oh God. Don’t let me be that twenty-something guy who goes back to his folks and leaches off of them. Don’t let me go back with my tail tucked between my legs. Or worse. Don’t let me be that late twenty-something guy going on thirty and still living with my parents.” Like I said. Crazy shit. Mostly, near the end of that second month I was just weary. I was holding two part time jobs that combined probably wouldn’t cover 1 months rent. I was borrowing from my parents, but I couldn’t do that forever. They had other concerns. My brother was about to transfer to a university in Baltimore and I didn’t want to have to burden them anymore than I’d already been doing.
It was near the end of the second month of searching that I received a call one day regarding one of the resumes I’d faxed to this little tiny company. They wanted an interview me for one of two open positions. I went into the interview with my hopes subdued. I’d gotten calls for interviews before, but had never received so much as a return call. I wasn’t expecting much out of this one, but it wasn’t as if I was busy with anything else.
All I can remember from the interview is that the company had just been acquired by a bigger company and they needed to staff up for the acquisition. I met the owners and the employees. All five of them. They requested some of the lab work and reports I’d done during school. I didn’t know why they wanted it, but I was more than happy to oblige. Thankfully, being a giant anus with a retention problem came in handle in this instance. I’d saved every report I’d ever done in college. The moment I got home I faxed them some samples reports. After sending the fax, I basically went back to my routine, because I didn’t think the interview was that great. Three days later I received a messege on my answering machine. It was a Mr. Klusmeyer indicating that they wanted me to fill one of the openings if I was still interested. Still interested? Hell yeah! He left a number and I was dialing for dear life immediately after getting all the information off the machine. He gave me a number for my salary over the phone. At the time in my mind, this was the largest number I’d ever heard. It wasn’t until later that I found out this wasn’t as large as I had thought, but being a begger doesn’t allow one the option of saying, “Shove that number up your rosebud, and give me a better number.” I wouldn’t even have known what a better number was. That was how sheltered and naive I was. Still a kid. All this of course is beside the point. The salary wasn’t great but I later learned it was in line with what any dumbass kid with a college degree in electrical engineering from a third tier school with okay grades would make. The point is that I was not shafted.
I took the offer. So far if I had to rank the moments in my life when I felt the most euphoric, that moment would definitely be in the top ten. I sound so pathetic for saying that, but I was genuinely happy to have gotten that job. I called the parentals immediately afterwards to let them know that their oldest son is not leaching off of them any longer. He can actually pay back what he owed them. So endeth the epic first job search.