Manager vs. Tech Specialist. So I’ve been thinking a lot recently about my long-term career goals. Among the primary questions I’m asking myself is: do I want to take the managerial route or become a technical specialist?

I guess it’s on my mind cuz if I’m going to go the managerial route, I should be seeking out a different job task pretty soon. (My mentor and boss and pretty much every other Bechtel person has told me that you spend around a year and a half or two years in a position, then you should try something different (within the company, of course). They really advocate the jack-of-all-trades mentality early in your career if you have any aspirations of becoming a manager. “That way, when you’re a manager, you’ll know a thing or two about what everyone underneath you does, and it’s harder for them to lie to you about how hard something is or how long it should take.”)

I guess I should give a little backstory about my company. So we’re kinda like a subsidiary of a bigger multinational corporation (Bechtel), and basically all the managers are from greater Bechtel (we call them “Big-B’s”). Most of the grunts and cubemonkeys however have been here since before Bechtel swooped in and took over the operation (we’re called “little-b’s”). The project has been here for decades, and every few years, a different company takes control and they bring in a bunch of new managers, but the worker bees (the little-b's) are all the same. Anyways, so there’s a pretty different mentality between the Big-B’s and little-b’s on how to shape your career. And I don’t think either side’s necessarily right or wrong, but if I plan to stay within the Bechtel umbrella for the next few years (more on this topic some other time), I probably need to buy into their philosophy at this point.

Anyways, as for being a tech specialist... It’s not that I hate what I do- on good days, it’s even halfway fun; but I don’t know if this is what I want to do for the rest of my life. If you’re good at finite element analysis (and have ~5+ years experience), the best money is to become a contractor, where you can make up to ~$150-200k apparently. The drawback to being a hired-gun though is that you don’t get benefits, and they can terminate your contract any time they want, so it’s not “secure.” And really, I don’t think that’d be a bad way to go. BUT, I worry about the long-term future of the field. Why? Because like many other high tech jobs, it’s something they can probably do better and cheaper in India or China. >_< (I hear several of the major automotive companies already do the bulk of their finite element work in India.) I don’t know how long we’ve got- maybe 10 maybe 20 years, but I really think that eventually, 90% of finite element analysis jobs are gonna go overseas. And yea, there’ll always be niches like government and defense-related work that’ll always be done domestically, but I DO think the market for this kinda job is gonna shrink significantly in the upcoming years. And anyways, if I choose to stay with Bechtel, I’ve already been told: there’s no future in finite element analysis with the company.

Ok, well what about being a manager then? The biggest thing I worry about is the fact that I’m not a real people-person. I’m better with numbers and computers than I am with people, and my public speaking skills could definitely use a lot of work. And I guess I worry that I’m not outgoing enough, don’t know how to chum it up with (read: brownnose? HAH!) the overlords well enough to ever move very high. And yea, part of me feels like on the whole, there’s more overall job security as a tech specialist than as middle management.

I dunno, tough question(s) to think about. I get the same kinda feeling as when I was job hunting and didn’t know what kinda job I was looking for. *sigh* Sometimes life is easier when your decisions are made for you, eh?

Addictions. Funny how you can use a product a few times, and before you know it you're addicted and don't know how you ever lived without it. Chapstick is way up there on my list. Now, when my lips are anything but pig fat greasy, I feel like my lips are cracking from dryness. Then I touch 'em and they're still perfectly supple, and I resist the urge to swab 'em down with petrolatum. Then 2 minutes later, my willpower cracks and I curse my weak will as I put the chapstick to my lips. -_-

Another one is that alcohol hand sanitizer stuff. This is probably the one I'm most disappointed at myself with. Using this stuff has turned me into such a germaphobe. =( Like before, I'd just kinda wipe my hands off on my pants and say I was ready to eat. Now, anytime I touch anything that someone else has touched, I start feeling like my hands are covered with grime. And it's not just when I'm eating; like if I walk down some stairs or take an escalator and put my hand on the rail, like 30 seconds later, I feel like my hands are filthy, and I wanna wash 'em or use hand sanitizer. And I hate it cuz I feel like I've lost like 10 man points worth of ruggedness to this dirty hands complex. I HATE you, hand sanitizer...

...I'm SORRY, I didn't mean it! Let's never fight again. Hahaha, j/k... or am I? *sigh* I'm so enslaved. =/

So my b-day this year fell on the same day as the Super Bowl and was totally overshadowed. Which was just as well, I suppose. I didn’t really end up celebrating at all, and the game at least kept me amused. I dunno, I guess it’s true- after 21, there really AREN’T any more birthdays of particular significance. I just feel like I’m getting older.

I can’t believe that high school (9th grade) was a whole decade ago. (10 years since I was in the marching band, 10 years since I quit the band, 10 years since I last played the trombone at all.) It seems like just yesterday. I mean, I still remember the events and conversations as clear as anything that happened just last week. It doesn’t SEEM like that long ago, and now when I think about how long ago it really WAS, the only thing that flashes through my mind is where did all my time go?? I mean, if you think about it, I’m already like 1/3 dead! =/ *siiiiigh* One year older…

*Started getting sick (flu?) on the b-day and was feeling the aftereffects for ~2 weeks after.

Stones Better Left Unturned? You know, I’d always been skeptical about those stories of ppl who suffer something so traumatic that their subconscious erases all memory of the event- (the human memory just didn’t seem so fickle to me). But recently, I discovered that I too had buried an event in my subconscious. (And still, I’m not really sure if I buried it, or if it was something that I had just chosen not to think about for so many years. Anyways…) I don’t recall exactly what triggered it and caused me to remember, but it all came back to me suddenly, and it was a nearly cathartic moment, and part of me wanted to cry.

I was molested as a child. I was probably somewhere between 4 and 7 years old. I can remember where it happened, and that even then, I was old enough to feel like something wasn’t right about it all. And I still remember what they said to make me think it was ok, that it was perfectly normal.

I still can’t remember who it was, and I don’t know who to be mad at for it happening. Whoever it was though, it was someone either in or close to my family, which makes it that much harder to think about. And part of me can’t help but wonder: so many years removed from the incident, do I really want to know who it was? Is it sufficient to say it happened and leave it at that? It wasn’t a repeated event- (does that make it any more forgivable?)

And I can’t help but wonder now how the whole incident has affected me psychologically over the long-term. A lot of times, I DO feel like there’s something wrong with me- (it’s not normal for ppl to be this socially dysfunctional, is it?) and now I wonder if this was IT. I mean yea, I was old enough that I still remember it happening, but young enough that I didn’t understand the implications at the time. Can I really point to something like that in my youth and say that that’s when everything started going wrong?

Is that why I’m hesitant to trust new ppl? Why I get unusually squeamish in unfamiliar situations? Why it feels so hard to connect with ppl- and why I’m more comfortable opening up to a computer screen with all this than an actual person? Why I probably still can’t bring this up in conversation with a real person? And hell, why I doubt the general goodness of humanity?

I remember my parents having me see school counselors for a few years in elementary school cuz they thought something was wrong with me but didn’t know what (supposedly, I was never a happy child). Maybe even then, they recognized that I was psychologically damaged goods. And I dunno, thinking back, I don’t know if you could go back in my childhood and say there was just this ONE thing wrong, but I think a lot of things add up. And if I wiped this from my mind, I’m sure there are other things I’ve buried as well that I’ve yet to uncover.

I dunno, on good days, I’m thankful that I remembered this important event in my life. On bad days, I wish I’d never unforgotten it. =/ It’s a heavy cross to bear.