Careers

I applaud everyone that has found their careers, I'm still searching, probably because I haven't been in one of those "turning point" jobs. I have never held a typical minimum wage job. In early high school I bagged groceries for "tips only", averaging $6hr when the minimum wage was $3.25. Later in high school and after I was working in an architects office, moved up from plot plans and floor plan layouts (all board drafting) to marker-rendering elevations.

After 3 years of that I joined the Navy, and was duped into an electronics career path. I say duped because I wanted to join to be an illustrator (DM rating) but was told that I couldn't go into that field directly, I would have to cross-rate into the position. In tech school (A school) I asked to cross-rate, they said I needed a portfolio, I made one. They said I missed the review cycle, wait till the next one, I waited. When that time rolled around I was in my specific tech school (C school) and they couldn't let me cross-rate because my rating (FC) was undermanned and they had too much money invested in me. I enthusiastically completed my contract and got out. Grrr!

After 6yrs of that I joined Corporate America as a SolidWorks user and mechanical designer, and have jumped from manufacturing, to medical devices, to aerospace. I've been lucky in that for the past 12yrs I have been solely involved with design and R&D, working closely with engineers, master machinists and "lowly" drafters and CAD operators. Much like a few others I know, mechanical design just came intuitively to me, like my artistic talent being natural. I could never understand why others couldn't just sketch what their eyes were seeing, and couldn't understand why people didn't see why a particular design wouldn't work well.

This has held me back from going to school to get that coveted degree, because I don't know what degree(s) I should go for. Do I go into engineering and neglect my artistic side? I already know what to expect in that field, and could make a "real" career out of it. Do I get into art classes and neglect my rational and analytical side? I've thought of it, probably more now than I have ever in the past. I have a problem with getting a degree like that, paying an instructor to tell me about things I intuitively know. Who knows, maybe I'll just open a small tiki bar on the beach and call it a day.

The Return of the Living Tiki

Its funny how some things are present your entire life and you take them for granted. Growing up on the Space Coast of Florida, I took rocket launches, sunrises over the Atlantic and blue skies for granted. Soething else I took for granted were tikis. As a kid I had a pendant, probably of Ku, with red rhinestone eyes. I was always interested in primative art, tribal masks, and tiki gods. I find it strange that something like that could just fade from my memory over the years. I wonder what memories covered my tiki memories, covered them like a layer of dust that just got thicker and thicker over the years. It got so thick that I no longer acknowledged those memories, or at least didn't give them much consideration.

That was until about 18 months ago, probably February 2007. That is when I did my first acrylic painting, and the subject matter was a tiki. From that point on, the dust and cobwebs of my memory began to stir. That sediment that hid such an important part of my life had broken loose, allowing me access again to something important to my life. I know all that dust will have to settle somewhere, but I'll worry about those other lost memories in due time, when I am ready to rediscover them.

I have discovered that I am not alone in my love of tiki. My roommate, Greg, shares the same interest. Another friend Jason has recently rediscovered his (with our help). What I find interesting is that there are even more people out there that have the same and even deeper interest, and all of those people can be found in one convinient location: Tiki Central.

www.tikicentral.com

What bothers me is that it took me so long to rediscover tiki, and I'm talking real tiki. You see, there is a difference in what people consider tiki, and that difference is geographical. If you grew up on the East Coast of the USA, you were probably influenced by the Caribbean, parrots, pineapples, and toothy-faced tiki carvings. If you grew up on the West Coast of the USA, you were probably influenced by Polynesia, primitive art, Don the Beachcomber, pineapples and real tiki. At least, as real as real tiki can get since it is a post WWII import and interpretation. I've experienced both now, and I'll take the West Coast version, thank you very much.

July 4th, 2008

We just managed another successful Independence Day celebration at my friends house in Palmdale. The $2000 fireworks run in February (to Pahrump, NV) paid-off in a big way. We started the neighborhood show around 9:30pm and finished up around 10:30pm... just in time for the police and code enforcement to park at the corner to observe "nothing" happening at the house. There were fireworks going off all around us, but we were by far the loudest and most active the entire night.

No one got hurt or arrested, and no fires started, it was a great night.

I understand the reasons for fireworks being illegal, but we should have the right to celebrate our Independence! Sparklers and Smokin' Snakes just isn't going to cut it. Many people just use this day as an excuse to BBQ, drink and blow stuff up, but for me it goes deeper than that. Imagine the colonist and how they felt when it was announced that we were officially cutting our ties with Great Britain.

John Adams himself wrote about Independence Day, "It ought to be solemnized with pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations, from one end of this continent to the other, from this time forward forever more."