That Time I Hitchhiked to the Air Force Recruiter's Office
Best dumb 20 year old Todd spur of the moment decision ever.
So early today I was reading a post on my friend Don’s newsletter and it reminded me of a story of my own along the same vein.
I didn’t want to step on his post in his comment section, so I figured I’d come write about the story over here on my site.
I had my “dream” job … or so I thought.
When my dad retired from the Air Force, we moved to New Port Richie Florida to be near my grandmother and aunt. I graduated high school at RAF Lakenheath in England a few years early, and then worked as a waiter and bartender (oh man, that reminds me of even more stories for a later time) before my dad retired and we moved back to the States.
My first job was telemarketing, selling vacations or timeshares or something.
It was horrible.
Then I got the job I really wanted. I was hired as part of the grounds crew at Innisbrook golf resort. This place was nice! They even host PGA tournaments there.
Sure, I had to get up at 4am, then work pretty hard for 8 hours.
But one of the benefits of the job was getting to play free golf on these beautiful courses. (I’d played a few years of high school golf in California, then recreationally in England, so was pretty avid at the time).
Fast forward a couple of months …
I was always too tired after work to play golf, so I hadn’t used that benefit at all yet.
Sidebar (but relevant to the story): The previous weekend I’d gone to party with my cousins, and while it was fun, I had noticed that there were dudes that appeared almost in their 30s, still hanging out at parties smoking weed with kids barely out of high school.
The Life Changing, Almost Impetuous Decision
So one day, I was pulling crabgrass out of a green with a fork (yep, that’s how we did it) when the head groundskeeper drove up and asked me if I would spray the herbicide on a couple of fairways, as he had an errand to run.
He usually drove along the fairways in a cart, reaching down to spray as he went.
I thought that’s what I would be doing too.
Nope.
He unloaded two big canisters (think propane tank) that had to weigh about 50lbs each, told me which fairways he wanted sprayed, then drove off with the cart.
I think I made it about halfway up the first fairways dragging those tanks as I went.
I started thinking about the party.
Would that potentially be me in 10 years if I stayed here?
I quit my golf course job 5 minutes later
I looked around, took off my hard hat and white Innisbrook button up shirt, walked off the property to US-19, and hitchhiked literally straight to the Air Force recruiter’s office. (something I had sworn for for 3-4 years while still in England that I was never going to do).
I sat down with the recruiter and regaled him with stories about what it was like overseas (he’d never been), got an appointment to take the ASVAB (scored 99% 🙃), then a few weeks later a trip to MEPS.
My parents were both surprised and not surprised when I told them.
When I was at MEPS I knew I wanted a guaranteed job (based on my ASVAB score). I didn’t want them assigning me to Security Forces or Aircraft Maintenance. But at the same time, I didn’t know exactly what I wanted to do.
They gave me a list of all the available jobs in the upcoming fiscal year and told me to choose five. I don’t remember exactly what all five were, but one of them was weather forecaster … and that’s the job I got.
Mind you, at this point in my life I had no particular affinity, or even interest in weather.
But that would end up being my career and almost even somewhat part of my identity for the entirety of the rest of my adult working life.
I arrived in San Antonio Texas for Basic Training on December 28th, 1989.
The rest as they say is history
A little over 36 years on from that day on the golf course, I feel like things worked out pretty well for me.
I can’t say that all of my spur of the moment decisions as a young man worked out the way I would have hoped.
But man, that one sure did.
Looking backwards, it’s amazing to observe how the thoughts and feelings we had decades ago, and the actions that flowed from them, could have had such profound impact on the direction of the rest of our lives.
Can you recall any of these types of seemingly insignificant (at the time) decisions that ended up changing your whole life?
Every photo tells a story, and stories are better with company. If you enjoyed this post, please pass it along to a fellow explorer. Thank you!
I can’t believe I didn’t see this post the first time around, especially as you included a link to my essay!
As I’m sure I’ve told you, my trip to the recruiter‘s office was also spur of the moment, and I didn’t tell my parents until after I joined. My father, who did his four years in the army, shook his head and said, “It’s a waste of four years of your life.“
It turned out to be worse than that. But my mistake was joining the infantry. It was terrible for my sensitivity and emotional makeup.
But I’ve made other spontaneous decisions that have turned out to be very good ones, for example, the day I broke up with my girlfriend and drove to New Mexico. 😁
Amazing that you recognized that you didn't want to be like those thirty year olds still smoking weed with the high schoolers. Well, you're obviously quite intelligent, but that doesn't necessarily mean that you could see your future. Yet you did! Thanks for Don's story and and yours. I will always read what you've posted. Even though I'm retired, I can't spend hours reading people's posts, but I look forward to yours.