The Life of Me: Collector's Edition

One Year Later...

I separated from military service very nearly one year ago. What a difference a year makes. I was pretty much a psychological wreck, and I'll tell you why; I thought that the tasks assigned to me (utility privatization, housing privatization, interim executive officer, interim section commander, various additional duties) pretty much had zero point. The first two items were wrapped up in a morass of bureacracy that might take years to wade through (and as anyone in the military knows, and officer's time spent on any one task is ephemeral at best), the next two forced me basically become a lap-dog to an incompetent commander whom I despise, and the final item proved to be a time wasting nuisance. All those things put together make for one unhappy me. The thing I've learned about myself is that I always want to focus on just a few tasks and accomplish them well by working through the problem elegantly and coming to a clean solution. I think that's the engineer in me. Those tasks I mentioned above--there was not an elegant way to approach them and there was never a clean solution. Because I was not dealing with an engineering problem. I was dealing with inefficient organizations populated by idiot non-engineers!

heh...ah, the hubris.

It's funny...there was a time when I desperately didn't want to be an engineer. That was back in college when I was slogging through upper division courses in CE. Where and why did I develop this attitude? Ultimately, I think was just a matter of me resenting the fact that a lot of the stuff I was made to do back then didn't equate with common sense. I don't dislike non-engineers; I think I dislike ineffective bureacracies and the people who've adopted the mindset that perpetuates them. Many of the most interesting people I know aren't e's, after all.

I was a wreck personally, as well. Concievably, my job left me feeling quite a bit unfulfilled. That feeling transferred over to my personal life and I started engaging in friendships and relationships that probably were not healthy. That girl that I referred to in the let it go piece I wrote some days ago was an example. It's wierd, but lately I've been thinking about all those stupid, self gratifying things that I had done in the past. I had an epiphany; when I was writing the let it go piece, I thought I was writing it as a person bemaoning the current state of morality in our society with me taking the moral high ground (of course!). But really, it was a reflection of me, or more specifically, the person I have become. That is, perhaps it is I who has become less caring of my fellow man, more proud, and more materialistic. During lent, I wrote that I was losing faith in man. But maybe I'm just expecting too much out of people and not really seeing how little I actually give back. And I am materialistic. I don't amass toys and gadgets, but I have been coveting registration as a PE. But to what end? A promotion and a raise?

So anyway, here I am. One year later. But still looking back. Not longing for the past, of course, but rather reflecting on how I can reconcile all this baggage I built up for myself at Vandenberg and finally move on.

I wonder if this made any sense.

posted by anthony fuego @ 10:39 PM