Rob The Plumber

I try not to fall into any “should have done this” or “could have done that” thinking, but I’m really starting to wonder about passing on the plumbing thing.

My father owned a small plumbing business, and a couple of summers as a laborer convinced me that I wanted nothing to do with it. All I could see from my narrow slice of the world was a pathway that lead to a life in basements and under sinks —but what I didn’t see was the opportunity to be a businessman. My thick teenage skull couldn’t understand that the goal was not to be the guy doing the work, but the guy making the money.

I was reminded of this after the NY Times did the inevitable plumber story after Joe the Plumber became a national celebrity. But the plumbers the Times wrote about? These were successful, Einstein-quoting guys with 4,000 square foot offices running shops where their top employees “clear two, maybe two-and-a-quarter every year.” Yes, the workers, not the managers.

But, no…I had to go work in TV.

Anyway, no point in having regrets or in making the obvious TV career vs. plumbing career crap joke. Life is life and when you get right down to it, it’s just a matter of which end of the pipe you’re looking through.