After college and seminary – real life – YIKES! [Post #4]

(Continuing from blog post #3, I will, in the next couple of posts, finish a very brief outline of my journey on my “path,” then on to other topics.)

So, I did have a good college experience in Seattle.  I never really knew what I was going to do after college.  I thought of teaching, but after a short stint of being a teacher’s assistant in my first year of college (a fifth grade class at a local school), I realized that was not for me.  So, I ended up majoring in history for no particular reason other than I had taken a lot of history classes.

I did enjoy being away from home and loved living in the dorm at school.  When I had a chance, I would drive out to the Magnolia Bluff area of Seattle, overlooking Puget Sound and contemplate life and my future while watching the ships and ferries cross the sound.  It was a great time just sitting there in my little VW bug, absorbed in thought. I spent many hours there over my four years thinking what am I going to do with my life, but no answers came to me.  I realize now that I was really just delaying getting out into the real world and having to “do something” with my life.

The social life was good. I developed some very good friendships and ran around with a good group of people.  I did like the academic life, this coming from someone who never thought of going to college at all while in high school.  

That nagging thought kept coming to me, about what I was going to do after college.  That thought became acute as graduation neared.  By the time graduation did come, I had decided I would continue with school and go to a theological seminary in Chicago and study and possibly prepare to be a minister.  That would keep me from having to face the “real” world for a while longer.

So, it’s 1971 and I am in seminary studying for the ministry in an evangelical church.  Once again, another good experience trying out new things in a new environment. My first year there was exciting and I learned a lot and even did some preaching at a hospital connected with the church.

As I say, I enjoyed the year there but as the year ended I had decided that maybe I needed a break from all this.  I had been in school for a long time. So one day I talked to the dean and informed him I was planning to take a break from seminary to think things over.  He seemed to understand but told me, “Wally, I know you will be back. This is where you are supposed to be, this is your path!”

One memory that is burned into my mind as if it just happened yesterday was of that day I was driving away from Chicago in my VW bug packed to the ceiling with all my belongings. I looked out my window as the Chicago skyline faded into the distance and the thought really hit me… WHAT NOW! This is it, I now have to really face what am I to do with my life, no more hiding in the academic world.  This is it!

At that very instant, I realized that I wanted and needed to get out and travel and see the world!  That was it, the thought hit me like a bolt of lightening out of the blue. The next thought was, how am I to do that? What type of employment would allow me to fulfill that desire and goal? I knew I wanted to fly, be a pilot, but that would take time and money for training.  Ah, I thought. Maybe I should work for an airline.  Travel and see the world while I train and become a pilot. Yes, that’s what I will do! Bingo, all those years unsure of what I wanted to do finally had some resolution in my mind.

It’s amazing how a thought like that just hits you out of the blue in an instant, and you know it is the right idea. So, I’m going to try to get a job with an airline and travel and get on with my dream of being a pilot which I had since the age of six.  The pieces of the puzzle (of my life) are finally coming together! 

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