Part 3 How I became a gun dealer.

Time went on, lives were busy, and it seemed easier to run a construction business or my Jeep business than taking on the man and jumping through more hoops than fido the dog at the Barnum & Bailey Circus.

Let's jump to 2007 now. Does anyone remember that year? Our homes went from 400k to 91k in a matter of 1 year. I was in the home building business, and then no one was in the home building business. Unemployment was not on my life's list of things to do. For the first time in my life, I had no job and no hussle. My income reflected other people's willingness to move up or expand and wanting to play. The boom of fun ended when people could no longer pull out the free money from the home equity interest-free loans. I had to find a job. Living on the $1800.00 a month unemployment was not going to work. We were lucky, I received a nice severance check, and for once in our life, we had an excellent savings account.

Sometimes being one of the first to go is a plus. The fear of losing your job can be overwhelming. You hope to be the lucky one and not be on the cutting block, but instead, you are on the first few rounds of layoffs. I focused on why me for the first month. I was an important person, and I did what others could not do. I did not think that the opportunities to find new work were better at the beginning of a crash. Good secure Government jobs started to come at us, the pay was horrible, but the jobs were there. I was offered a job in Hawaii with the Navy. $25 an hour. That was close to what I was making at the time, less my side business. I was excited for about two days. Then I found out $25.00 an hour is potato cart pushing wages and passed.

My dream of living on the beach did not include sleeping on the beach as housing was too expensive for 25.00 an hour. I was then offered a job at Camp Irwin with the Army. I was going to work on the weapons targeting range! Yes! Guns, ammo, and targets! I said yes, I want this job. I drove to the Base located in Hell, Ca. to get my pre-employment stuff done. The HR lady told me my new job was to build the targets. Ok, This was a letdown, but I get to see things blow up! My new boss was some John Wane hardass with more brass on his collar than in a high school band. Yes, sir! That was all I heard. People were very intense and moving fast. The war was on, and Fort Irwin was the last stop before heading to war. We were to drive 21 miles further into hell, "The middle of no place." We would build an Iraqi or Afghanistan village in 1 day. The next day it would be assaulted by the troops, and then the tanks would roll in a blow the town to hell. I would not get to see the exciting part of the job because I would be in another area building the next village for the next class of killers. Well, it is for the troops, I told myself. My new boss told me to come back in a week to start my new job. He also said to dress appropriately for 120+ degree temps. Great! It's Somalia all over. The following week I sat in my in front of my house truck crying. I was about to leave my family, be 200 miles away, live in my toy hauler and not see my wife and three kids for two weeks at a time. I could not drive away. I was scared as it had been about three months without work now. Something was saying don't go. I called my employer and said sorry, and I would not be reporting for my job. Looking back, I was being prompted not to go and, and I was about to find out I had PTSD.

It had been nearly eight years since getting out of the military. I had time between serving and now. I have buried some of my issues, but that hole was not deep. I received another job offer about one week later. This time, they found me and offered me a job. They asked me to go work for the USAF in Clovis, New Mexico. I thought about it for one day and said yes. In my mind, the Air Force was not like the Regular Military, and My PTSD was not going to be an issue, and for the most part, it was not. So I drove to New Mexico and left my family. It was much easier this time. I was excited to get out of CA. I would miss seeing my parents, but my wife and children are the most important, and we needed a safer place to live.

It would be two months before I would see my family again. I was living in a rundown hotel next to the train tracks. My new job was relatively slow at first. I don't remember doing any work for the first three or more months. Just come to work and stare at a computer that I could not use. I was waiting on my security clearance and the IT people to get me into the system.

Meanwhile, I went around with another person who did have some work going on. His name is Don. Don is a funny guy. Ok, wait! Im off-topic already. It is so easy to get off-topic here. As I am writing this, I think of so much I want to say, but what is the point? I was writing about my adventure to become a gun dealer.