In the spring of 1980 at
Jefferson City High School, I was a graduating senior and we pretty much ran
the place. We had done all the work. We had figured it all out. We
had arrived. It was our school. We were the top dogs.
In November of the same
year, I flew into San Diego one pleasant evening and boarded a camouflage
school bus with 43 other young studs. Seconds after the bus pulled to a
stop behind an old barracks, an angry man with four stripes on his sleeve came
aboard the bus and told us we were not supposed to be on the bus, but instead
should be lined up in neat rows outside. He'd apparently received a report that we were
the stupidest bunch of recruits they'd ever received, mentioned our mothers, and
said that "you'd better not be the last one off this _____
bus!". In the scramble for the door, I quickly realized that I was
no longer the top dog and had possibly made a bad mistake.
After more than three years
in the Corps, I'd made my way to sergeant with a few stripes and was in charge
of the night crew maintenance on some million dollar helicopters. During
those wee hours each night, everything thing that happened in the squadron came
through me. I was the top dog.
Less than a year later, I
walked into my first class at Southwest Missouri State University. Looking
around the room I wondered if these kids had really been to high school or
possibly just middle school. The English professor was talking slowly to us to
make sure we didn’t get too confused. I
was nowhere near the top dog. I was a
Freshman.
After years of endless
study, projects, exams, and hard work, I
was now a senior in Mechanical Engineering at the University of Missouri –
Rolla. I’d endured a daily beating with differential
equations in Dr. Crosbie’s heat transfer class.
I had passed an eight hour comprehensive exam in engineering. With a
sharp resume and new suit, I’d successfully interviewed fifty times and pulled
down five good job offers. I had done
all the work. I’d figured it all out. Surely
I was some sort of top dog. I felt successful.
A week later I started my
new job as a Design Engineer with the Paul Mueller Company in Springfield. I arrived prepared to design something. On day two, I approached the desk of the division
secretary and asked where a completed large format drawing should be
filed. With an eye roll and body
language that spoke volumes, she informed me that “we don’t fold them like that”
and asked, “don’t they even teach you to fold drawings up there at Rolla?”.
Yesterday we completed the
Alaska Highway in Delta Junction and it reminded me that the end is often just
the beginning.
