I spent almost ten years in the military before I decided I had enough.
I had been trained in HVAC while in the military and I was sure I should be able to get a job in HVAC now. I had a lot of experience in furnaces, but I didn’t have my HVAC certification. I had to find an HVAC company who would help me to get my certification. I put in several applications and I hadn’t heard anything back from even one. I was going to go to the local college when I got a phone call. The HVAC company had checked my references and they wanted to hire me. They were going to put me on as an apprentice while I went to school. They were going to pay for my certification classes and I would still be getting paid to work. My days were starting at 6AM and they sometimes lasted until almost 10 at night. Between going to school and working, the summer was the longest I had ever experienced. My wife didn’t like the hours, but she was really good with me. She patiently waited for me to come home at night and my dinner would be ready. She even studied with me when I had studying to do. Fortunately the job helped me with all the studying I needed to do. They would send me to a job that would correlate with what I was learning that week. It was a long summer, and the workload was crazy, but I got my HVAC certification and I have a good job.