I like to hear stories from other surveyors about how they got into surveying and their journey through the profession. I have a story, and I have come to terms with the fact that my life is not in any danger of being an autobiographical best seller. But none the less, it might be of interest to one bored surveyor that is procrastinating from doing their work. In order to give you a sense of why I started SPS, I will go all the way back to the beginning of my story. I will break it up over several posts in order to only slowly bore you. I intend to post a piece every other day until I get to present time.

The first domino to fall in my journey to becoming a surveyor was pushed over by a girl.

Chapter 1

I had just graduated high school and did not have a clue what I wanted to do with my life. I wanted to stay in my home town because I was dating a girl that had one year of high school left. So I rented a small house with a friend of my and I started taking basic classes at the nearest junior college. I was working part time and loving life. At the end of May, I was finishing my first year at the juco and she was graduating high school. That next week, she promptly dumped me to pursue life. Because it is hard to hide under a rock in a small town, all I wanted to do was to leave town. But I had no where in particular to go and at the time, I was unsure how this was going to happen.

One day in July, a friend of mine that I had graduated with, also named Brad told me he was moving to Tyler to go to surveying school. He also needed a room mate to split bills, so he laid it on thick and heavy about how I needed to move with him to go out of dodge. Well it didn't take much to twist my arm at the time, so I was all in. I knew I wanted to continue to go to college, but I still had no clue as to what career path I was taking. So in early August, we made a trip to Tyler Junior College to enroll. On the drive there, we thought it would be a brilliant idea to take the same classes, you know..... then we only had to do half the work. Made sense at the time. Now the only thing we thought we knew about surveying came from some lying surveyor my friend talk to one day. To summarize, 'Surveyors make lots of money. Especially if you get your license!' Can you believe he said that with a straight face? So.... Brad and Brad, from the same small town in Texas, walk into surveying class on the first day thinking, "We don't know a thing about surveying, but we can't wait to get rich!"

To be continued.......