So; there’s me, a blank piece of paper and a
fountain pen sat sitting at our dining room table. You might think that what I was about to do
was complete madness but it seemed to be quite sensible to me. How many people have actually sat themselves down
and truly worked out what it is they want to achieve from life? I had met so many people who were working at
jobs that they hated, or lived in areas that they hated. Most people were not completely happy with
their lot and most of those could only see a positive and massive change in
their lives if they won the national lottery, or were lucky enough to have some
sort of providential windfall.
But where do you start? I thought that the easiest question I would
pose to myself would be about where I wanted to live, that was easy. But it wasn’t easy. I discovered that I actually wanted this process
to work, to mean something to me so I told the truth, yes, in a perfect world I
would want to return to Ireland but I was worried about the situation over
there. It wasn’t so much the effect it all
might have on my children but how I would react to it. I wasn’t the sort of person who kept his mouth
shut and there’s a reason most of the sane people in Northern Ireland are
referred to as ‘the silent majority.’ Scotland
was an option but unfortunately Scotland has as much religious bigotry as Northern
Ireland does and my mouth worked in just the same manner no matter what country
I was in.
Then there was the job problem. I could go back to school or university and
train for a profession. I felt that
seven years to become a doctor was far too long as were the standard courses
for dentistry or even the veterinary sciences.
I got on quite well with my new local dentist; we were the same age, he
admitted that he had considered joining the air force as a dentist. He was a lovely fellow but I couldn’t imagine
myself standing in the same room for twenty five years. I considered teaching and couldn’t see myself
finding anything exciting in teaching, in a way it was similar to dentistry, standing
in the same room year after year, would drive me mad. And I suppose that was the key underlying
point in the whole exercise. I had to be
truthful about myself; I knew I got bored very easily, which can be very
dangerous for one’s career prospects.
There were still the police and prison service
options and I had noticed that the police had an accelerated promotion scheme,
which was quite similar to the civil service fast stream entry system, which
did interest me a little. I still had
the ‘can do’ attitude from the armed forces.
To move to a new area for employment purposes was no great problem but
it did concern me when I began to look in to it in depth. Sure I would move to a new area but I would
not be able to live wherever I wanted. My choice of houses available would be governed
by how much money I was earning and then even those would have to be within a certain
radius of wherever I would be working. I
could convince myself that I had choice, but in reality only a limited amount
of choice.
Another problem I was having was that I knew I
would have to respect my boss and most of the people I was meeting in Civvie Street
didn’t exactly measure up. I could also
see that ordinary trade’s people were earning good money, like plumbers or
electricians. With a trade under my belt
I could travel and work almost anywhere in the world. I was pleased to find that I was actually considering
manual trades as it sort of indicated to me that I was thinking straight, I wasn’t
being influenced by society and the ‘I am better than you are’ attitude. There was a period during the early days of
the greed is good culture when certain fellows made the national newspapers because
they were earning vast amounts of money from jobs that normally people would dismiss
as simple manual work.
The first of these people was a fellow who
became known as ‘Super-Hod.’ This chap supplied
a team of plasterers on a building site with plaster. The key to his success was simplicity itself,
most people used a standard hod that they would buy from their local building supplier,
Super-Hod made his own. I’m not sure of
exactly how many times bigger than a standard hod this creation was, but it was
being reported that this fellow was earning twenty times the average hod carriers
wage. I think at the time the average weekly
wage was in the region of forty five pounds whereas Super-Hod was clearing at least
one thousand pounds per week. He was
very popular in the tabloid newspapers. In
fact I do remember that one newspaper gathered together a group of ‘Super’
workers from bricklayers to carpenters and had them build a house. The house was completed in double quick time
and wild claims were made about how this is how people should work.
At the time the country was going through a bit
of a recession and the government especially were encouraging people to follow
in the steps of Super-Hod and his colleagues.
No one bothered to mention the fact that after a few years of this type
of work you would be worn out, but why ruin a good story with details. The other important fact that was reported in
the broadsheet newspapers and not in the tabloids, funnily enough, was the fact
that the house that had been constructed by Super-Hod and his mates had fallen down
and was a complete wreck.
So for me it was simple, yes, hard work would
bring rewards, but what job should I turn my hand to? I knew it would have to be exciting, and
outdoors, I could never see myself in one office for the remainder of my
life. I needed travel and adventure. From the people that I had already met in my travels
as a publishing executive or audiologist I knew that there were not very many people
I respected, so perhaps the best person for me to work for would be
myself. I could go straight into
Liverpool airport and take a job as an air traffic controller. I would earn decent money but that would be
it, that job that money, would determine everything about my life and, I would
have to spend the remainder of my working life locked in a room with cretins.
My piece of paper is still blank so I begin to
write. I decided that I should try to
live in the Republic of Ireland. I would
have to work for myself, but what at? I didn’t
have enough money to buy a franchise, again plenty of opportunities with franchises
but still with limited outcomes. I
could see people with no education earning exactly the same as some highly
qualified people. Then it hit me. The perfect job. I would work for myself, be my own boss. I could live anywhere I wanted to in the
world, I could work as hard as I wanted to and as often as I wanted to,
although I found it strange that I would be in one room for the remainder of my
working life. I wouldn’t be out and
about meeting people and having adventures.
I would be sat sitting on my behind working away at a desk.
However, if I was successful, if I was good
enough, I could achieve everything I had set out on my plan. I could even go back to my original plan of designing
and building my own house. All I would
have to do was go to Ireland and buy a field, well yes get some planning
permission too. I don’t know why but my choice
of career seemed to sit perfectly with me, I had decided to become a writer. I loved books; I loved reading and was a
complete literary nerd with a slight mathematical bent. I cannot tell you how excited I was. I made my way to my local library and
gathered a group of technical books about writing. The first fact I came across was that writers
are expected to produce seven hundred and fifty words each and every day. No problem.
I sat down with my fountain pen and writing pad. At the end of day one I had written one
hundred and twenty words. It began to
dawn on me this writing lark might be a little more difficult that I had
imagined.
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