I tend to view my life as having three stages so far. My "childhood" growing up on Chicago's south side, the next twenty years of my life spanning my military career and my civilian life after retiring from the military. As with most things in life, each of these periods has had a profound influence on the person I have become. Each has had its good points and bad points, triumphs and losses, happiness and regrets. If I have managed to acquire any wisdom over the years, it is that such things are what make life worth living!
The first 17 years of my 
life 
were spent on the south side of Chicago.
As the third of four children 
, I grew up in a lower middle class neighbourhood mainly populated with first through third generation immigrant families.
Both of my parents 
worked while I was a child.
My mother waitressed while my father worked in a factory forging steel axles.
As such, my siblings and I were familiar with the concept of "latch key kids" before that term ever became popular.
I'd have to say that we were not hurt by that situation when you consider that one brother is close to retirement from the First National Bank of Chicago, the other works for a successful industrial pipeline inspection company, my sister became a housewife and I retired from a military career.
Perhaps it had something to do with our father teaching us in no uncertain terms that misdeeds resulted in unpleasant consequences?
I'm afraid Dr. Spock would not have approved, but then again, it evidently worked.
Growing up in the midst of German, Polish and Ukrainian immigrant families provided some interesting insights that proved helpful over the years. Mainly that regardless of our background, language, customs, etc. we are all people with the same hopes, fears and expectations. Of course, there were other interesting side effects also! To this day, I love kielbasa and despise the smell of sauerkraut! <<smile>>
After growing up in the 60's, going through the riots, '68 Democratic Convention, etc. I came to the conclusion that Chicago is a nice place to visit, but I'll never live there again. This is not to say that I have anything against Chicago itself. I feel the same way about virtually all of the big cities. Having lived in or near Chicago, Dallas/Ft. Worth, Denver and San Francisco with visits to Atlanta, Los Angeles and Detroit, I simply have no desire to put up with the downsides of living in a big city. While the young may be fascinated with the speed and bright lights of big city life, I've come to truly appreciate the meaning behind the old Chinese curse "May you live in interesting times". For the foreseeable future at least, I'll be staying where I'm at.
After high school, I joined the U.S. Air Force.
I spent the next 20 years in the Strategic Air Command working as a Defensive Fire Control 
technician on B-52 
bombers.
This was an interesting system which included two radars 
(one for scanning, one for tracking), two computers (one for balllistics computations, one for auto-tracking), a hydraulic system to drive the gun turret, a pneumatic system to pressurize radar components and provide high pressure air for the pneumatic gun chargers, heated integrating gyroscopes for space stabilization, an optical gunsight and closed circuit TV (for the 'G' models), various other supporting electronics and the weapons themselves (.50 cal machine guns) along with the ammunition feed system.
Keep in mind that much of this had to be crammed 
into a relatively small space on board the aircraft.
As you can see, to be a successful technician in this field, one had to be a "jack of all trades".
To make matters more interesting, much of the technology used was 1950's era vacuum tube stuff.
This means that most of the "black boxes" weighed in at rather hefty weights.
For instance, the ballistics computer weighed around 140 lbs.
The radar power supplies weighed 60 lbs. each.
The guns weighed around 50 lbs. each.
We normally used a crane to change an entire gun turret 
since it weighed in at right around half a ton.
In the latter part of my career I also filled various supervisory positions.
During those 20 years I was stationed at Lowry AFB ( Denver CO 
), Carswell AFB (Ft. Worth), Dyess AFB (Abilene Tx), Ellsworth AFB ( Rapid City SD 
), Wurtsmith AFB 
(Oscoda Mi), Castle AFB ( Merced Ca 
), Anderson AFB (Guam), and U-Tapao RTNAF ( Thailand 
).
I also spent some time at the Air Force Weapons Lab 
at Kirtland AFB ( Albuquerque NM 
), Wright-Patterson AFB 
(Dayton Oh) and Mather AFB (Sacramento Ca), with short "visits" to a variety of other places 
.
All in all, while the pay was pitiful for a highly qualified airborne radar/computer technician, I did get to see some of the world and met a lot of superb people over the years.
I retired from the Air Force in 1990 and moved to Tawas City, Michigan.
Never heard of it?
Not surprising.
It's a small community on the Lake Huron shoreline in Northeastern Lower Michigan.
The kind of place where the weekly newspaper reports every crime committed in the county, where children can still play outside without fear of a drive-by shooting, kidnapping, mugging, etc.
While the local pay scale is low, so is the cost of living.
With several hundred thousand acres of National Forest to the north of me, the Lake Huron shoreline to the south and east, and a multitude of lakes, rivers, and streams in the area, this place is a nature lover's dream.
After living for years out west, I also find the abundance of fresh water and four REAL seasons refreshing.
After retirement from the military, I started my own small electronics repair shop. As owner/lead technician/head janitor, it kept me occupied and added some income to my pocket. Not much mind you, but along with the military retirement pay, it let me live fairly comfortably, if somewhat modestly. Finally after four years, I decided to close the shop down. Though the business was still making a profit, with the prices for parts continuing to rise and the cost of new TV's and VCR's continuing to fall, the handwriting was on the wall. Rather than wait for the bitter end I decided to find something else to keep me occupied.
That "something" ended up being a technician in one of the local computer stores. Since I've been working (some would call it "playing") with personal computers of one type or another since 1982, I found the work interesting and (for the most part) enjoyable. After a year of that though, I decided to move on once again.
I restarted my old company but moved it into the web page design and Internet related fields. When the computer store I had worked for closed down, I also expanded my business to include computer repairs, maintenance, networking, etc. While I didn't get rich from it, I did enjoy the work. It kept me occupied and (usually) out of trouble.
Finally, at the end of 2016 I closed the business down for good and fully retired. I have a few hobbies to keep me occupied and I enjoy tinkering around the house. I'm also generally enjoying life! <<smile>>
These pages provided courtesy of Rick Simon - All inaccuracies, errors, and/or inanities are his responsibility.