A repost from CL- When did I become that which I loathed?

My gawd...I'm "one of them". I grew up in a clean but down-scale neighborhood. The local grocery store was in a strip shopping center and was immediately next door to a bar. As a kid, I remember seeing the same cars there every time we went shopping. The same people went. On TV, were shows including "Cheers" that showed the same people in the same bar night after night. My parents raised me well, giving me a huge variety of experiences. We camped in over 20 states. We always went with a challenge. We would do whitewater rafting for the first time. We would find the existence of a rare species of bird, mammal or plant. We'd go rock climbing, even once slept ON a rock face, suspended from our ropes. The folks encouraged us to be physically active and to take on at least one semi-sport where we could measure our individual performance and track whether we were getting better or worse - not to compete against others, but merely as a yardstick to know we were improving ourselves. Oh, and the mental exercises...we'd all read a book on some topic way too advanced for our ages, then debate what it meant and how it impacted humanity.

Each of us kids got into a different "thing" that led to a career. One got into how the human brain works. One got into early childhood development, one got into music and I'm the idiot who got into electronics. I can spin out a new product design in days and it'll be clever and new and revolutionary. "The Corporation" requires that the prototypes get shown to customers to make sure customers think it's just as cool as I do. And then things grind to a halt. A firestorm of paperwork (we have forms to fill out for permission to fill out another form!) ensues, documentation departments roll in, "approvers" argue about whether we should buy widgets from a supplier we've never used before, executives fly to vendor's cities to make sure they're real...sheesh. By the time it hits the market, the corporate tax burden for all this triples the price, and the timing has been so delayed, that - well those early customers exuded positive vibes and other companies figured out how to develop a similar (but not identical) products, and we are now "late to the market". I dread going to work. It does not pay to be innovative in any of today's big companies.

My sibling who got into early childhood development? Tried a career in education, but soured of it quickly because "decent educational ideas" and "government-mandated schooling" could not be more separate. "They're intentionally ruining the children" said the sibling. She started an at-home child care, where the only government involvement is quarterly inspections to make sure her kitchen is sanitary. The musician? Had two pop hits, and got frustrated at the whole industry - it's not about good music, it's about marketing and merchandising. No room for true creativity. What's he doing for a living now? Distributing sheet music for churches. The one who got fascinated with the brain? Produced a couple of startling theories about neurotransmitters, got funding to study them, then the funding source (National Instiate of Mental Health) declared his research to be "tainted" because it was not in lock-step with their orthodoxy. He's now just a second-rate (by his admission) family and child counselor.

So, about once a week, me and the co-workers gather at a local McMen's and reminisce about why the hell we had any ideas about being creative and innovative when we were young. "Feel like a number". That particular McMen's has the same cars in front of it every night....