What's your day job?

[Magicman]

Telecommunications for 32 years, and given the Magicman nickname by my fellow repair technicians in 1972.  Downsized/retired in 1994 at age 51.  I loved woodworking and I had a cabinet shop so I started doing carpenter work to make a few $$.  The carpenter work lead to sawmilling in 2002, so this is my 20th year of sawing.

[Poquo]

Machinist for 39 years 17 at Newport News Shipbuilding then 22 at Jefferson Lab a Physics lab. Retired March 2018 started woodshop in my garage, sawdust addiction led to buying a sawmill now I want to set up a kiln. 

[WV Sawmiller]

   Started with family business younger than would be allowed by law today putting up monuments and chain link fences, summer jobs at plywood plant and paper mill, college school bus driver, USMC officer for 13 years, assorted overseas work mostly building and running construction and military camps with a few month OTR truck driving thrown in and several years helping set up and train clients to use our work process software (I was a souped up user not a data dink) then bought and started portable sawmilling career 7 years ago along with building a few rough wood projects like benches, birdhouses and my ever famous Pooh houses (Composting toilets).

 In between that time we raised two wonderful kids, still working on four granddaughters and a grandson and hosted seven foreign exchange students each for a school year.

  We combined the overseas work with some real wild travel (generally private tours) to remote areas in Africa, the Amazon, Europe, where my free lance photographer got thousands of wonderful pictures of people, wild animals and landscapes and I collected over 900 pages of journal notes.

  My problem remains I still don't know what I want to do when I grow up.

[Nebraska]

I am a cow doctor much as the tv shows portray (we try to be a little safer in our methods)....Servant to many, master to none. My day job is sometimes a night job. 6 kids, 4 usual, 2 came via the foster system. Two grandchildren, two cats, a Labrador, a few pack goats and more blessings than I deserve.

[wernerbrandes]

This is a fascinating thread, glad you started it. I'm a Creative Director in the marketing division of a global non-profit. I've been in marketing/digital for 15 years.

I work with ideas, words and stories so much ... it's no wonder all my hobbies involve working with my hands!

[Ljohnsaw]

My entry back a few pages:My day job

[Coopthecutter]

Recently quit a very well paying job at a land clearing company (100k+ per year, potential to take over business in the near future) to go back into logging. Doesn't pay near as good but satisfaction is way higher and stress is way lower. Get to spend much more time with my family and get to do a job I truly enjoy vs just working because the pay is good. At 30 years old I'm not sure I'll be in logging forever, but I'll be here until I literally can't pay my bills because it's not paying enough 

[Iwawoodwork]

In high school (jr-sr yr) worked for auto prats store delivering parts around town, after graduation from high school, commercial fishing along the Oregon coast (Coos Bay) for only one summer, seasick most of the time, then the month I turned 18 went to work in a plywood plant, after 6 years and 3 different plants I went to work for Weyerhaeuser in logging road construction which included logging the right of ways, operating heavy equipment with some work around the rock crusher and Quarries, Driving dump and log truck , bucking timber and short periods of time on the rigging. We were a union company and I became a safety/shop steward and then chair of the logging safety committee for the Coos Bay division, while still working as a logger/equip operator. Then elected by the loggers and mill workers as a fulltime union rep for about 9 years. I had been appointed to a volunteer position on the state of Oregon OSHA logging safety code committee in 1977 and in Nov 1990 was  hired as a manager for  OR-OSHA, I worked For Oregon OSHA for 20  years until retiring. Now I have a hobby mill and older dirt moving machinery to play with.

[Durf700]

I have been in the modular home business for 22 years now.  I also was in law enforcement as well, but got out of it several years ago.. glad now that I did.  I am the general manager for one of the largest Modular home companies in the Northeast US.  its been a good job, hoping to stay in it until I retire in my mid to late 50's! 

[Don P]

 I've done something with wood I guess my whole life. Dad was a residential contractor, I was sweeping up from an early age until I graduated to shovel, and broom. I mowed lawns, worked in a greenhouse/truck garden, drove the bus and delivered pizza's after class during HS. Graduated early after my freshman year in college, got hurt and spent a couple of years working for a camping store/canoe livery, doing lots of broken canoe and kayak repairs. By that point in time I was the only hell mama had ever raised, but that was plenty.

Went into millwork, furniture and cabinet shops for about 10 years. Usually had shop space rented somewhere for my tools and side jobs. That bought our place and got the house started. Got tired of being inside but at the time I could throw a rock and hit 2 carpenters in any direction and we had few housing starts here, I was low man. So we expanded our notion of local and hit the road. We built log homes all over the country for a dozen or so years. I bought the sawmill when we got home to the aftermath of an ice storm in '93. We were ready for cabinets and trim by then and there were nice trees overturned everywhere.

Around 2000 her family circle needed to tighten and we came in to stay. I've worked construction in the area since. Being home means I can mill some of the materials for jobs which is more fun for me and the customer. Michelle became the manager of the local farmer's market when my shoulders came undone in 2011, she is also a bookkeeper and exec director of our local land care group, somebody amounted to something  .

[TimW]

 My problem remains I still don't know what I want to do when I grow up.

We know Howard. ;)  Any day now. :(  You gotta grow up some day. :D
        hugs,  Brandi

[Crossroads]

Right out of high school I cooked in a restaurant for a few months, then took a job setting chokers behind a D-6 Cat. After a short time, I was given the opportunity to run a yarder. Then moved and went back to setting chokers,  but under a yarder. Then I ran a delimber for a couple years before going to work in a pulp and paper mill. After 7 years I ended up in maintenance, completing a 4 year apprenticeship to become a millwright. After 16 years I moved to north Idaho and ended up as the lead millwright and planner tech for a cross laminated timber factory. In 2021, I left the CLT plant and started running my lt40 full time as a mobile sawyer. 

[Stephen1]

Started on the Railway right after 3 attempts at High School. 18. Worked as Lineman for the Telecomunications division, went into track rebuilding/repair on heavy equipment. Then onto the trains where I spent 35 years as a Locomotive Engineer. I built the log cabin on the left which found me here and then a small sawmill and then I retired 9 years ago to saw partime, I now do Custom Sawing and Drying fulltime, specialising in sawing for the homeowner repurposing thier yard trees. The GirlFriend says I failled at Retirement ;D

[thecfarm]

I have a different job now. I work in a small-town hardware store. It's fun to solve other people projects. 
As I tell them, I can butcher anything.
It's quite a sight as I drag them around the store showing them ideas sometimes.  ;D
Then there are some customers that know what they want, but have no idea how to do it. We so called brain storm until it comes out the way they want it.
Much different than my other job I had. I use to work on robots and trouble shoot them and reprogram.

[WV Sawmiller]

Brandi,

 I respectfully but very vehemently disagree. You may have to grow older but you never have to grow up unless you let yourself do so. I'm just a young man trapped in an old man's body trying daily to get out. ;)

  No matter what people say Fight it! Never give up. (Like the poster of the bullfrog choking the heron trying to swallow him!)

[DWyatt]

Being one of the young ones in the group, I appreciate seeing more background on some of the members that I get advice from. I graduated college in 2016 and started working for a small surveying and civil engineering company. The owner and founder of the company had been doing this for 35 years after his stent working as county engineer. In January of 2020 myself and the surveyor purchased the company from him. He was still the signing engineer until June of 2021 when I was able to test and get my PE license. Three days after getting the email that I passed my PE exam, the previous owner had a stroke and has been retired ever since. I was and still am very green and learning every day and I was scared to death when he called to tell me about the stroke. 

We represent 4 different communities ranging for 4000 people to 15000 people as consulting village/city engineer and do a lot of private commercial site design. We employ 11 people, up from 8 when we bought the company. Business ownership was always my dream and now I couldn't imagine working for someone other than myself even on the days when my boss is a jerk.

[redbeard]

Looking back at my 2012 post I planned on staying with my day job working for a civilian contractor on a Navy Base til 2024 then retire. Well I happily left that job on a volunteer lay off in Oct. 2017 and have been full time sawmilling since. 
Having a part-time sawmill business established it was a good choice too get out when I did. 

[KenMac]

Congratulations on things working out well for you Redbeard. Sometimes I think God takes care of us better than we do.

[DanMc]

Graduated from college with a BSEE in '83, worked in the computer hard drive industry for 20+ years in MN, OK, CA and MA, raised 4 kids, now working as a software engineer for automotive GPS applications.  Bought 28 acres of wooded land in Conway, NH 6 years ago.  That led to getting an HM-126 mill, now waiting till June '23 for an LT35HD.  Hoping to work out of engineering and milling into retirement.  

[Maine Miller]

Worked for a Defense contractor in Mass. for 5 years right out of High School. Moved back to Maine in 1987 and in August will be 35 years building steam and gas turbine equipment for power generation. Bought my first mill, an LT35, a couple years ago in anticipation of my May 1st 2023 retirement date.

[SawyerTed]

For 30 years I was in Career and Technical Education. For 4 years I taught electronics at ECU, then taught high school Technology Education for 6 years.  Then I worked in local and state administration of Career and Technical Education for 20 years. I retired in 2015. 

Over the years I've done various things on the side.  I've remodeled houses, designed nearly 80 houses, built cabinets and furniture. From 1989 to 1993, I helped raise tobacco.   From 1994 to 2006 I raised  corn and operated a cow/calf operation with 35 to 50 brood cows.  I ran a landscape crew during a couple of summers when I was teaching high school.  

For two years after I retired, I was director of maintenance and facilities and a prototype technician at a small manufacturing plant.

Now I am managing a wood products company making wood shavings for poultry houses, bulk and packaged firewood and soon to be making fence posts.

[dogone]

    Grew up on a farm so learned how to work there. Out of school worked on railroad for a year , then ten years oil exploration in artic and North Africa . somewhere along the way got a comm pilot licence and have been crop duster and bush pilot.worked pipeline, hail adjuster and hunting outfitter.Ended up back on the farm after my wanderlust passed.
    Enjoyed all the jobs but picked most to make good money. Retired at 58 and 70 now. Still got lots going on with sawmill.
   

[azmtnman]

I was a farmhand in high school. Did 2 years in the Navy. Got out and went back to the farm. That wasn't enough to raise a family so I went into the farm service industry. That was too much springtime and good weather work so I went to school and did HVAC/R for 20 years. In 2010, the Lord called me to move to the mountains of Arizona to be a property manager and mission team host and, somehow, tricked me :D :D :D into being a part-time pastor and full-time missionary on a reservation. That turned into me getting the sawmill and doing the woodworking and building as part of my mission.

[jb616]

I've been working at an Office Furniture Manufacturer for 42yrs.  Started out as machine operator, fork lift, assembler and so on until 2012 where i got into Health and Safety. In 2018 i got into our corporate office, bought 40 acres with my son and restored my sawmill (1984 LT 30) that I bought from a friend. Now on the weekends we play on the property, saw lumber, hunt, or fish. Looking towards retirement in 2 years or so...

[Resonator]

Started out on a career path in construction, built my first house with classmates in high school building trades class, then went to technical college and got a degree in residential framing and cabinet making. Did some work building houses, but found most employers wanted experience, not education to get hired. Took a "temp" job unloading semi trucks on delivery routes, stayed at it, and later became a driver (class A CDL). Stayed in truck driving for 20 years (about 1 million miles), driving for different companies and traveling all over the US and parts of Canada. Drove everything from single trailer and double trailer refrigerated, flatbed, curtain-side, end dump, side dump, conveyor belt dump, and 7 axle 96,000# belly dumps.
In 2017 I bought my first sawmill (and joined the Forestry Forum) and determined I loved sawing.
I sold the first mill and then bought a Wood-Mizer LT28, and set myself up as an LLC. In 2018 I quit driving all together to become self employed, and kind of came full circle back to working with wood and start "Chasing the Sawdust Dream" (name of my thread ;D).
I've also worked many different temp jobs, have done volunteer snowplowing for my church for the past 22 years, and on occasion have been paid to play music in front of live audiences.