Education

Most people misunderstood this. I meant foundational education, not higher education. My wife and I knew that we needed a degree because nobody would hire us with only a highschool diploma. We also could only afford a rural state university because after scholarships and grants it was almost free, and free is basically all we could afford. It was also understood that our degrees would get us absolutely nothing (worthless in almost all sense of the word). Because we had strong foundational education, we were able to absorb and process, and because we knew the degree would be worthless we taught ourselves other skills. So by the time we graduated I already had a fledgling PC and network support business (which led to my first corporate job) and my wife was well on her way towards being able to have enough skill to work on databases including based, SQL Server, and Oracle. None of this is what we wanted as a career but if was something we figured would feed us.

It really sucks that marriage is now a financial necessity in the US.

Context is important here. I was an orphan at 16 and wife's parents live in a poor eastern European nation. We literally had no support structure and no safety net. I don't know if it is necessary for everyone, but it was for us.

I hope this is a joke. What a sad way to look at life if not.

Not a joke nor do I romanticize it. We shouldn't need to feel like there's a gun to our head or that we are under the master's whip at all times in order to do our best. I'm my case and my life experience, I can't help but love in constant fear that I could be destitute at any moment if I stop trying so hard. I don't know if that's sad or not because that's all I've known since my mother died, but the results are clear. When my friends and colleagues quit or took a break, I didn't. When my friends felt comfortable in their cushy jobs, I quit and took a harder job I was not fully qualified for (I lied my way in) and trusted the fact that I could teach myself how to do it before anyone figured out I couldn't. When my career peaked, I quit and started my own business, then another, then another, etc. I'm not smart. I'm not brave. I'm terrified that at any moment I won't be able to work anymore and I'll have to live off of what I've made so far until the day I die, and I'm not sure it's enough. Trauma is real, and I understand that's what I've got, but the results speak for themselves. Fear and hunger are great motivators.