This piece hit home.
As a kid, I wanted to be a priest, a cartoonist, or a car designer. Never happened.
Why?
Let’s start with the priesthood: When I asked my parish priest, Father Ignatius, about what it was like to serve God, he said it was great, because the church provided food, shelter, and clothing — a much more materialistic answer than I expected.
Cartoonist?
Well, I liked to draw — but the quality was far below what a studio like Disney required.
Car designer?
My doodles and scribbles of cars were not much better than my sketches of people.
“Ka-Boom!” Dream gone.
For years, I puttered around, doing odd jobs, like construction, washing dishes, painting, selling vacuum cleaners, driving a laundry truck, working in a grocery store, and the like. For a while, I did some clerking at a little independent Christian book store . The owner/manager recognized my love of reading snd suggested (sincerely) that I should consider writing. A brief stint as a reporter at a weekly paper followed. I was hooked — but soon realized that without a degree, I had no long-term future. Eventually I enrolled at the University of South Florida, double-majoring in Mass-Comm & Poly-Sci.
After graduation (1977) I went to work for The Tampa Tribune, where I wrote and copy-edited for more than a decade. I’m long-since retired now, though I routinely free-lance, mostly news releases.
Medium.com is one of the little gems in my life. It was here that I discovered the joy of writing poetry.
That gets you up-to-date, though I did write and self-publish a book.
Anyway, thanks for provoking my thought with this fine article. I hope it prods others, prompting them to respond.
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