Mama Kat Thursday: Dream Jobs

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Today's Mama Kat blog writing prompt topic is, "Share something you wanted to be when you grew up."

I graduated in 1975.  That means my growing-up years were the 50's, 60's and early 70's.
 Career option considerations for women back then were a little bit different then they are now. There were no personal computers, no smart phones and the employment opportunities for women beyond being a school teacher, a nurse, a secretary or a factor production worker were still in their early days of expansion.

Dr. Saddler & Dr. Grant (Laura Dern & Sam Neill)
with a Triceratops in Jurassic Park 1.
 I had 2 career ambitions while growing up:
First, like most grade school kids looking at a few dinosaur pictures, I wanted to be an archaeologist. 
Then I learned how painstakingly exacting and boring digging for buried history actually was and lost interest.
I realized I didn't have the patience.

Roy Desoto (Kevin Tighe) & Johnny Gage
(Randolph Mantooth)
Then in 1972, when I was a freshman in high school, a new television show called, "Emergency!" started airing. It followed the activities of one set of firemen at Station 51 as they participated in various emergency rescue situations with a primary on the two Fireman Paramedics, Roy Desoto & Johnny Gage. 
At the time this show was on the leading edge of a major revolution going on in the emergency rescue industry with the introduction of highly trained "paramedics" acting as the doctor's eyes and hands in the field. It was new. It was a tidal wave movement.
I watched the show avidly and decided that's want I wanted to be--I wanted to be: a fireman paramedic.

However, it was still the early 70's. A woman in the fire department was still an extrmem rarity. Plus, after reading up on the physical strength and endurance requirements for the profession, I eventually decided it was out of my reach.

What I did do after graduation was join the Air Force and, in an ironic twist of fate, was selected to be trained as a Medic. I worked in the hospital. Though I liked doing it well enough while in the Air Force, I didn't feel like the medical field was my long term cup of tea. So, when my service time was up, I got out and went to school to study graphic art.  
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As an interesting note, Mr. Mantooth, has remained an avid supporter of the fire department and the medical rescue community and is a frequent speaker for fire department rescue, EMT & paramedic events.
You can check his speaking schedule & more at his website:
His Facebook & Twitter links are under "Blog."
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So what did were your dream jobs as a kid?


Thanks for Visiting!
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Want to join the fun? Visit Mama Kat, sign up for the topic list, then write  a post on one of the topics and link-up every Thursday!

Comments

Gem said…
What did you end up becoming? Did you enjoy the graphic art course/degree? What a big leap by the way, from medic to graphic artist! haha! Enjoyed reading this blog post. Thankyou!
Sep 17, 2015, 5:36:00 PM
May said…
Loved Emergency! I doubt there is an episode I didn't see. We are children of the same era. Not many of us girls headed to the Air Force after graduation. That was a bold choice.
Sep 17, 2015, 8:51:00 PM

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