If you had to start over...

This is not a good plan B. I am driving now after 23 years of turning wrenches. Trust me. Stealerships are the worst to work for. Most jobs are warranty and dealership land thats 1/2 labor rate. Twice the physical abuse. And twice the stress. Only real benefits are consistent (1/2 labor) work available and as long as you are good at BSing the Manufacturer or Warranty company you don't have to contend with some service writer whos only "game" with women is discounting YOUR pay.

 

LOL, I'd probably be just barely graduating with a bachelor's by now even if I never left full time school. Academics were never my forte, but I never gave up either. Of course CA colleges started implementing that "four tries or find another college to fail at" policy.

That said, I would've gotten more sleep, and got my 1-2 years of time in with the mega uninterrupted. After that, probably move out of CA by 2006 instead of 2012 and more than likely still doing the milk thing.

 

Others will skewer me. But I blame the loss of passenger rail on the over-marketing of cars and passenger aircraft starting in the 50s. Now there's gridlock most places and even flights have to stick to some weird routing to save fuel. At least most passenger rail used to get out to "the sticks". These days if you're nowhere near an airport, or an Amtrak route, or not part of the Greyhound network, it's either car ownership, or thumb out/walking.

 

I would have chose another profession!

 

Yes and no, its the 50s through 70s really coupled with defered maintenance bad management and the disappearance of smaller companies into larger ones that were only buying the smaller ones for financial writeoffs.

The interstate highways and cars and to a degree air travel (which is its own problem and mismanagement debacle) also contributed, but it was the culmination of a large number of things all building over time. And then with the 80s, trains werent sexy and also were a political point for even dumber reasons

 

Don't even waste your time. If they really hated it as much as they'd like everybody to think, yeah, they'd sell their shiny truck and go play quarterback for the Cowboys or run for President or something.

 

If had to start my driving career over knowing what I know now, there's things I'd do differently sure. But why stop there? Hell I could take that conversation all the way back to high school if we're going to dream about mulligans and do-overs, but it doesn't work that way. One practical piece of advice I've tried to impart on others not as far into their career is to watch the job hopping. Eventually it just starts to make you look bad. I went through a period of that and it still reflects poorly on my 10 year driving history. Luckily I don't want to work for anybody anymore anyway but it will close some of the better company driving opportunities.

 

I graduated CDL school Feb 2 2017. No regrets wouldn't change a thing

 

Good advice on the job hopping. People can get away with it right now because there’s such a demand but if the economy slows down and there’s not as much demand for us drivers, job hoppers will once again be avoided. This is why you must do your due diligence when picking a company.