What I Want To Be When I Grow Up

I’ve been slowly going through some boxes of files I’ve been holding onto for more than a decade. The things my former-self chose to keep are mostly pointless: assignments, notes, tests… from as far back as the seventh-grade. I’m sure I didn’t keep everything, either, but the mound of paperwork I did keep is still overwhelming.

And that’s only in print. My digital collection of files extends back even further (all the way back to 1987, I believe) and in some ways, the digital problem is much worse. Need that conversation we had about CoCo Puffs in 1999? I probably have it, somewhere.

Before you start calling me a pathetic packrat, allow me to say that I am aware of the problem, and have identified it even further—”sentimental pack rat” is the term, I believe. The hardest part of resolving this issue is behind me–admitting that I have a problem. Now comes the hard work of eliminating the trail of my past that I’ve kept in two or three bankers boxes for most of my life.

While most of the things I’ve kept are completely useless and shouldn’t have been kept in the first place, there are a few gems.

Here’s one of them, from 8th grade:

English 8, 10-10-94

What I Want To Be When I Grow Up

When I grow up I do not want to be sitting behind a desk, wearing a suit and tie, talking to a guy from another country whose name I can’t pronounce having to watch every word I say so that I don’t offend him, trying to sell him a product or buy from him a patent.

I would rather choose a more exciting job like being a test pilot for McDonnel Douglas or Grumman, for instance. I would like this job because I would never have to worry about what to wear. I’d put on a flight suit, with no worries about matching colors, about brand names, or the latest fashion. No choices and no thinking while I am getting ready. Cool.

When I am in the plane, I’m in charge. I would not be driving a bus in the air (like the pilots of Northwest Airlines) and I would be able to fly the plane how I want to and see if it works to the specifications expected of its designer. I would also be testing myself, my knowledge and skill of flying, every detail about the aircraft and even my instinct. If things go wrong I’d have to make a quick decisions, not only to complete the tests but to perhaps save the plane.

I would hardly get bored because new planes, new instruments, and new weapons come out for me to test all the time. This is what I call a cool job, flying a plane, having fun, and getting paid.

There is only one setback to this job if the designers make a mistake, I might not be around to complain about it.

Hilarious. I also included a drawing.

I’m not sure how this happened, but at this point of my life—one year before discovering the Beatles, and two years before discovering programming—I was really into planes. Between the ages of ten and fourteen, my bedroom walls were covered with pictures of jets. I regularly absorbed books about the design details of anything with wings, and drew pictures of planes all the time. I remember all of that very clearly. What I don’t remember, however, is my apparent worry of what I might wear in the future, and fear of one day not being able to pronounce someone’s name.

It’s finding gems like this that assuage my negative feelings of being a sentimental pack-rat. For once, my former-self was correct in the prediction that my future-self would someday take great pleasure in reading this.