Yah know, as little as I liked sitting in a college classroom, I hate sitting in training classes even more. College classes? Took maybe 40 minutes of information. Presented it in 50 minutes. Gave you homework and exercises to do on your own. Gave you tests to demonstrate that, at a minimum, you crammed the information for regurgitation at least once.
Training classes? Take about an hour of information, cram it into a mere 8 hours and then everybody gets a completion certificate at the end. Now, this one, I couldn't sleep through it and pass, but anybody who tries is going to pass. Almost all the work is done in groups.
Unlike groups in college, everybody in the group really is trying to contribute and do a reasonably good job.
So, there's really no doubt about finishing this thing.
Once I have this certificate in hand, I should be able to wangle my DAWIA Level I certification. If I were a younger man, this would be an interesting career field to go into. I doubt I'd want to do this for the government as a full-time job. Though I would certainly keep open the prospect of doing it for a defense contractor on the other side of the table.
Once I get DAWIA Level 1, I'm in the barrel for any contracting related deployments to the middle east.
I want to push these off at least until the completion of my 1L year. If I had to take a year off after 1L, that's not such a big deal. In fact there may be some genuine benefits to doing so, since I'm pretty sure I'd qualify for GI bill upon my return.
Also, I make O-3 in December, which is my last promotion for a while, and is a big jump from O-2. I wouldn't make big money, but would more than make enough to take care of my responsibilities while I'm gone and make some significant progress on debt, too.
So, crossroads number 1? DAWIA certification, the prospect of deployment overseas, and who knows, perhaps the prospect of working in contracts administration for a government contractor.
I have drill right after I get done with this class. As much as I like serving my country, travelling to Texas on my own dime is getting tiresome. I'll be getting a new CO in November. I really need to sit down with him and find out how he feels about me flexing my drills. My old CO was pretty awesome about it, letting me do 2 drills at once so I maximize the drilling I do per trip.
If the new CO is willing to be flexible, I can see how this could work very well. If not, who knows. No need to worry about that too much before it happens. I'd really like to use my drills and training to get the coursework done for Dawia Level II, but I think that may be problematic. Like I said, I'll see.
Crossroads number two is Law school which starts the week after I get back. This is a goal I've put off for so long, it'll be nice to actually do it. I'm hopeful that it will lead to another career, but who knows. It can be useful in a lot of ways. I just know that I've been wanting to go back to school ever since finishing my Master's.
Much like the break I took after finishing an Ironman in 2000, which lasted 11 years, this break has lasted 14. Heck, I took a 21 year break in my military career.
I may not have a lot of tenacity, but I'm no quitter, I guess.
I also notice they've changed up the curriculum in that Manufacturing Technology Ph.D. program at U of
Toledo. If I pursued that after Law School, that would take me right to the point where my son went off to college. At that point, I'd be as educated as I'm ever going to be.
Hard to believe that I'm 46 years old and I still don't know what I want to be when I grow up. Of all the things I've ever done, being an entrepreneur is my favorite. I'm also going to do everything I can to stay in Sylvania until Logan is off to college. So, that rules out most ideas of a new career.
So, right now, a mix of Navy Reserve, Law Practice and Entrepreneurism is the most likely future, but who knows.
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