On the bus...

Today on the bus this guy was talking, rather loudly too I might add, about dreams, and how it's ridiculous that people talk about how they are going to school because they dreamed to do something. Already, I felt myself getting annoyed, but then he said, "Like, no one becomes an Engineer because that was their dream, they just do it for the money." I reserve this particular pattern of reasoning for professions like prostitution and drug dealing, so you can see my hesitancy to throw engineering in that group.

At this point, the bus driver invited himself to this obviously open conversation based on the cavalier manner in which my fellow bus patron punk was talking. The bus driver said assertively, "That's not true. I don't agree with you at all. Lots of people dream of being engineers!"

I thought to myself, well THANK YOU for saying that. Obviously that is true, I live with one who loves every minute of his college of engineering major.

The punk kept talking, making up a bunch of stuff to back his stance, and he just sounded more and more ridiculous...but bless the bus driver's heart, he decided to stay the course and try to convince the punk to change his thinking. This is a game I love to watch and hate to participate in.

The bus driver shared an anecdote about how his cousin had always wanted to be a structural engineer since he was a very little soul blah blah blah. I felt satisfied with where the conversation was headed and was just about to stop listening when the bus driver decided to make his final point.

He said, "You know, I used to work at a law firm. Making money isn't all it's cracked up to be. Do what you love and then worry about money."

Here is what I will say, I agree with that statement full heartedly, but I just had to laugh that in his final moments my bus driver hero drove home his/our position on the engineering issue by entirely dismissing my field of study for doing what he was defending the field of engineers against. It was only funnier that no one even thought to dispute that point with him. It was as if he had referenced a behavior so obvious and common that no one even recognized it was disputable.

Fortunately, I needed a good laugh today, and I got one. But I fear in these moments that either I am not ready for the profession I have chosen....or it isn't ready for me. I am not sure which one it is yet, but all the same, I hope you could see the humor in that situation.