Conference quark::human_relations-v1

    
    Well I am not childless and I am only thirty but I have felt many
    of the pangs you seem to now be feeling... it is work, go home and
    feed the kids, do the house work that I never seem to get done,
    get the girls ready for bed and sometimes manage to squeeze in some
    kind of social life.  I am lucky in the fact that I have some very
    good support from friends but they are all rather well set married
    folks that are paying a mortgage rather unlike me who is paying someone
    else's in the form of my monthy rent check!!
    
    I would very much like to make a career move and soon.. for like
    you I also realize that if I don't do it now when will I??  But
    the kids are not old enough to let me study much at night or be
    left without a sitter while I am in class.. so the career move is
    on hold for the time being.  I would also like to go out my front
    door in the morning and look at my own lawn instead of the pavement
    in front of my apartment and a nice car and come home at night to
    a supportive person that can lend me some comfort and me him in
    return.. well the supportive person looks promising but the rest is
    still kind of fuzzy!
    
    The point I am making is we all feel enormous amounts of unrest
    at different times in our lives.. the unrest breeds more unrest
    and so goes the battle.. sure I have read all the books and heard
    all the speeches that say if I want it bad enough it is out there
    for the taking.. but where?.. how?.. and most importantly WHEN!?
    
    Unrest and uneasiness like anything else does pass.. I am sure
    of that or I would string myself up now!!!... guess it is just a
    matter of riding it out and shooting for that moon no matter how
    far away the illumination is..!
    
    later, gailann 

    Some folks seem to avoid crisis in their lives.  They appear to
    lead calm, organized, orderly lives, without losing jobs, getting
    divorced, having children die and houses burn, etc.  In my perception,
    these folks are getting the worst of the deal.  They lead boring
    lives, may even be boring to be around, and haven't experienced
    enough to understand and empathize with the problems of the people
    around them.  I am thankful for the crisis' in my live.  Thru dealing
    with them, I grow.

    I'd rather have a life without unchosen crisis.  If my life never
    includes a house burning down, dead children, divorce and such like
    disasters, that's fine by me.  I don't think that such a life is
    boring--it could have all sorts of good experiences.
    
    On the other hand, crisis I choose is ok: thus I have done things
    like fly to Tunisia (knowing basically no Arabic), arriving at 5pm
    after a long flight (internal time 3am), landing just before sunset,
    with no reservations and no itinerary.

    In my experience of small disasters (car accident, furnace not working,
    breakups with girlfriends), they are not fun.  Mostly they are lots
    of boring hassle with the auto-body shop, the insurance company,
    the furnace repairperson.  Much wasted time, no great growth
    opportunities.
    			-John Bishop

    RE: .0  "career changes"
    
    Several years ago I went through a radical career shift, not of
    my own volition, which has tapped into a previously underutilized
    talent for writing.  
    
    My vocation in life, when still in grammar school, was to be a Printer,
    and with that aim in sight I went through several years of schooling
    and apprenticeship.  Recognizing my abilities in areas beyond the
    technical aspects of Printing, my employer offered me a position
    in sales and asked me to take some aptitude tests to confirm their
    decision.
    
    The company they sent me to for this testing was called Johnson
    O'Connor Human Engineering Research in Boston.  They've been in
    the business of aptitude testing since the 1930s and use a battery
    of tests which includes finger dexterity, tonal memory, pitch
    discrimination, design perception and vocabulary.  The theory that
    they propound is that if a person has certain strong abilities which
    are underutilized they will suffer from frustration and would perform
    better in some area which called upon more of their ability.
    
    In my case they determined that I did not have a sufficiently objective
    personality to be successful in sales.  My employer ignored this
    assessment and I spent the next couple of years proving their theory
    to have been correct.  The clients that called for the hail fellow
    well met school of salesmanship did not put many commissions in
    my pocket.  The only ones I worked well with were the ones who wanted
    technical support and advice rather than sales patter.
    
    That was all quite a few years ago and unrelated to the reversal
    which led me to being a Take-A-Nickel Writer.  If the recommendations
    from the original evaluation had been followed I might have been
    here a lot sooner and I would strongly recommend that you contact
    Johnson O'Connor and investigate your hidden potential.  They are
    not cheap, but a friend who has also used them was quite happy with
    what she learned and moved out of banking and into music.
    
    			Dennis J. Ahern, bracero in the fields of high-tech

    Don't forget that this is DEC and one of the reasons why we are
    all here is that DEC will let you do anything you want to do if
    you are good at it.  Call Ginny Maderosian and ask that she send
    you information on the PTP program.  If you have an aptitude for
    programing you can pass the program and voila, you'll be a hacker.
    You might have to find your own sponser but most managers have employee
    career development as one of the things they are measured on.
    
    If you don't pass the PTP test, sign up for the OTP (operator's
    training program, or at least look into it).  If that doesn't work
    out there are many other such programs here that are just perfect
    for people like you and me.
    
    As far as the rest of mid life crisis goes.....I'm still trying
    to figure that one out..........(actually I'm not dealing with it
    really well so I'll save my advise for a better day....(where's
    the chocolate!))

    Well Ray, I'm still in the mid-life pipe, but about 6 years further
    along.  The hell of it is, I still don't have the direction I set
    out to get.  Like yourself, it was the fear of Calculus that kept
    me from a more technical carreer path.  I was a technician for most
    of my early working years, and when I went back to college at 28,
    it was only that calculus monster that drove me to major in English
    Literature.  After I graduated, I found that there was no path beaten
    to my door by perspective employers; liberal arts major meant slacker,
    communist, sexual deviate, and a few other things...so I became
    a technical writer.
    
    This I've been for 15 years, and I'm tired of it.  Its a wonderful
    field, and it has treated me well, but I'm tired.  So back about
    the 40 (God, I remember) point, I had my crisis.  Divorced, quit
    sailing, did est, contemplated my navel ad nausem, you get the idea
    (just noticed what lousy paragraph structure, please excuse, this
    comes deep).  Somehow, the thing that I thought technical writing
    would lead to, some kind of painless learning of the technical,
    some kind of recognition of competence, never came.  The mid-life
    crisis, for  me was set off by this, by loosing patience (my favorite
    cartoon is of two buzzards sitting on a telephone wire: Patience,
    Hell, I'm gonna kill something!).  I did what any yoyo would do
    in this situation: I became a manager.  Well, I did alright in my
    department, did all the things that a good manager does, but I got
    caught in a political squeeze that finished me.  This was at a small
    Silicon Valley company; not at DEC.  You might say that I scuttled
    the ship to save her; I closed the department and left with just
    my pants.  
    
    Haven't dared try anything like that again.  Like you, school does
    not seem like a good path; by the time you're done, you just get
    to start over again...I don't believe in life enough to feel I can
    win.  So I still write my technical manuals; I've pretty much set
    myself to continue with that...but maybe Ginny will get a call (thanx,
    .6!!!).  What I'm trying to say is that the answers don't come easy,
    they don't come by thinking about them; I've been that route:
    emphatically, it doesn't happen.  You, me, guess we gotta stick
    it out there again, take a little risk, try once more.  Geez, I'm
    too old for that kind of stuff!

The mid-life crisis set of feelings is not limited to people in any
particular social or economic situation, nor are any class of people
immune that I know of.  It happens just as much to those in the
"successful" big_house+country_club set as anyone else, perhaps more.
There seems to be a large element of "grass is greener" thinking in
it -- with the hassles of the big house and the "big" job, a little
apartment in the city and a lower-pressure job might sometimes seem
appealing.

On the other hand, there are times and situations when dissatisfaction
can be turned into creative energy to make for a happier, more satisfied
life.  As they say on so many news reports, it "remains to be seen"...

Dan Murphy (43, but not a member of any country clubs)

    
    Ray, a few years ago I was a senior financial analyst (Accounting
    degree and MBA).  BUT in the back of my mind I had always wanted
    to be a technical person.  When I got out of high school I wanted
    to major in a technical disipline, but in the early 70's there 
    weren't too many women leaning toward the high tech area.  A few
    years ago I went back to WPI for a BS in Electrical Engineering.
    I am now an engineer.  (And a very happy one at that.)  ;^)
    It was a BIG risk, and I'll admit I can't compete against the 
    kids that built computers in their basements at the age of five.
    But I do have the professional experience and poise that they may
    be lacking, and I understand DEC alot better than a new college
    grad.  It was a BIG risk.  But it was something IMPORTANT to me.
    I had to plan it VERY carefully, and it wasn't easy.  But (what
    I'm trying to say is...) if you want it bad enough, then GO AFTER
    IT!!!!  As for mid-life crisis, wellll  I too, thought things
    would be different by now, but looking back, I certainly have ALOT
    of good things to be thankful for!!!

    
    Re. to .5, How much was Johnson O'conner anyway? And how long are
    the tests? Just curious.

    This is a first for me but I understand that sooner or later
    everyone is sucked into making the transistion from voyeur to
    NOTES contributor.
    
    This note, and all its feedback so far, are really special:
    poignant, honest, alot of empathy.  "Humans relating" at their
    best . . . 
    
    
    			Kendra Theriault

    RE: .10 "Cost of testing"
    
    The company that I worked for at the time had been the printer of
    Johnson O'Connor's books on Human Engineering and I believe we had
    some sort of arrangement with them.  As for my friend who took it
    on her own, I believe it was in the range of a few hundred dollars,
    including followup analysis on a virtually unlimited basis.  I believe
    they are still tracking people who were tested decades ago as a
    continuation of their own research.  They should not be confused
    with some sort of Career Counselling and Placement type headhunter.

	Cheer up Brian!  (from Monty Python's "Life of Brian")
    "It's not so bad... Life's a piece of shit, when you look at it...
    always look on the bright side of life!..." I wish I had the entire
    musical score.

	Actually, the reason I thought of Monty Python, was because this
    reminded me of the one skit where the CPA is talking to an employment
    counselor about how he's always dreamed of being a Lion Tamer, and the
    counselor proceeds to discourage him from pursuing this fantasy.

	Anyway, I wanted to tell you: IT'S NEVER TOO LATE TO START!!!  Don't
    be put off by the fact that a few kid geniuses seem to be flooding the
    computer "brain-meat-market", you have just as much to contribute as the
    next guy as well as the benefit of a different perspective!

	There is always something waiting for YOU to make it happen!  Nobody
    else will ever be able to do it exactly the same way (if even at all), so
    don't exclude yourself from your destiny and think that you're doing
    someone else a favor!  Go for it and don't look back!  You'll be admired
    for the move in the long run!

	I'm still trying to get my Parents (even my Grand-Parents - even my
    Great-Grandparent) into computers because I have found so much enjoyment
    in this field that I want everyone to be able to experience it.

	I can relate to your fears of Calculus, believe me - it's sheer torture
    designed explicitly to "weed-out" the curious from the true head-bangers.
    I'll even go so far as to admit that I have yet to even complete a calculus
    course!  Well, as soon as somebody can come-up with a sensible way to teach
    the damn subject, maybe I'll learn it once and for all, but in the mean-
    time, I'll be damned if that's going to prevent me from hacking!

	I've been writing programs for years (some of which were pretty darn
    good ones at that) and I'm still shy of my degree in Software Engineering!
    I'm starting up night classes at the Harvard Extension school of Applied
    Sciences on Wednesday and plan on continuing at least until I get a certi-
    ficate, if not a Master's Degree, but if I thought I'd be doing what I'm
    doing now 5 years ago, my friends would have tried to have me put away!

	To summarize, ignore the counselor's advice; your destiny awaits!
    Start crackin' those books - that's what they're for!  Nobody else is
    going to do it for you (although I, for one, am willing to help)!  If you
    can read then that's all it takes - do you think a technical teacher is
    always going to be able to do much more than tell you what pages to read?
    If so, then think again, if you can read (which all of us noters seem to
    be able to do), then you can learn to program.  It's as simple as that.

	Start by checking out some of the technical notesfiles.  After you
    decide what interests you, then dive in and start swimming.  There's no
    hurry, don't torture yourself, just a nice refreshing dip into the know-
    ledge pool for starters.  Before you know it, people will be coming to you
    for the answers!  Nobody knows it all because there's just too much to know
    in one lifetime - it's infinite - there's infinite room for more hackers.

	Need I say more?  How about trying the TLE::LANGUAGES notesfile for
    starters.  This might be a good place to learn a few things about alot of
    different programming languages, as well as share some of your own exper-
    iences, etc.  Don't stop there, there are literally hundreds of other such
    notesfiles, and notesfiles are only the tip of the iceberg!  Go for it!!!!

								-davo

    p.s.  Just press the select key (or KP7) to enter the TLE::LANGUAGES
	notesfile to your notebook.  Enjoy!

    I can't wait for my mid-life crisis...
    
    
    
    
    
    It'll probably be such an anti-climax!!!
    

    When I turned 40 last year, I took a long look at my life.  I figured
    that I was roughly half way thru it, so I'd do some evaluateing.
    I decided that I'm not too old, and not too young, so it was just
    about time to try my hand at anything I wanted.  Since then I have
    started two businesses, begun to take art courses, got married,
    and quit smokeing.  The result???  I am now fourced to draw upon
    energy that I didn't even know I had.  I have never felt so alive!
    Boy, I guess life *does* begin at 40!
    
    Marion

    re: Age 40
    
    Somewhere between fact and fiction lies a plateau of numbers
    caustically labelled "mortality" rates and "generational averages".
    
    The youngest any of my "predecessors" passed away (dies) was 69,
    and that was due to complications arising  from drinking, smoking,
    lascivious behavior, and machoism.
    
    By extraplotating the 'natural death' syndrome into current
    terminology,i figure that at 50 i am 'almost' to 'mid life'
    (not to be confused with 'mid wife' (which sounds similiar).
    
    (I suppose a 'true' mid wife is the one that's in the middle of
    the other two, hmm ?).
    
    By keeping fit, i figure i should be able to go to at least 110,
    which would put 55 into the middle. Problem is, why would anyone
    WANT to live that long ?
    
    To the more serious vein, i don't think its 'too late' at any age
    to start doing  something else. The problem with previous notions
    that one had to be 'well on their way' by age 35, is based on the
    incompetancy theory. ANYone, who can be considerd to be the best
    in their field can start anytime, to wit : George Burns started
    his film career at age 80+, and  Grace Hopper Began her career at
    Digital at .. what .. age 75 ?
    
    Being old doesn't mean being helpless.
    
    At age 40 I found out something really interesting .. but it got
    scary after awhile. At age 20, there must have been 20 guys for
    every attractive, competent, nubile beauty. By age 40, there's seems
    to be only one attractive, competent, nubile male per 40 females
    looking .... ;^) ... really created some dilemmas ....
    
    Well, 40 is past tense, so is single and looking ...
    
    If this is an amid-life crisis ... then let it rip p p pp p p !
    
    Bob