Well, I don't know it just simply baffles me. I was watching the channels in the hotel
right you're flipping past the channels and all of a sudden the real housewives of whatever
the heck comes on and you're sitting here going like why the heck did these grown people
put themselves in these situations where it's gonna end badly like they just keep putting
themselves in these situations and I'm like man I know it makes for good TV and they get
paid off of that but I'm just like why as a grown person would you want to have to deal
with all that drama man you sell your dignity my man it's all for that money it's like it's
like why not I'll do something stupid on TV for money well they get together and they
always go on these trips and quote unquote half of these people they have businesses
but really they just sit around and then they go on these trips together and of course then
they're mad about the last big event that they were all at together and I'm like why don't
you just not be friends with these people because they're always like yeah so and so said this
to me at the art gallery and now I'm mad and then they want to play a game where it's like
oh yeah we're gonna play this game called who's on your wagon and we're gonna say who you
would throw off your wagon so let's go around and say that and they're just saying mean things
about each other I'm like why why did these grown people like act like middle schoolers
I don't get it I don't know I'll tell you what man why is Jersey Shore coming back I was
just like why why are we coming back with this wasn't that like 15 20 years ago now yeah
it was well anyways I'm Chris and I'm like a and this is the Donut Box podcast well man
it's a it's a great week it's going great we actually got to see each other for a little
bit man got to hang out down in the good old south Texas well not south Texas I guess it's
central I don't know is it central Texas or south Texas central Texas it's deep in the
heart of Texas if you ask people around here I'll tell you that much that's what they like
to say and I'm just like okay but yeah man it's it was nice the weather was actually
nice which is rare around here this time of year so you know counter blessings there yeah
it's crazy man well welcome to the Donut Box podcast we're so happy that all of you guys
are here welcome welcome I hope you guys have had a great start to your April man it's already
April and this year is like already flying by next thing you know it's going to be July
in like three months and I'm like man 2024 has got somewhere to go I'll tell you that
yeah and it's been going it's been going by way too fast man but you know excited for
some things happening in 2024 and you know what else is happening in 2024 a lot of things
are being talked about in 2024 and you know Chris and I we've been kind of playing around
with this free flow idea where basically we don't have the normal structure that we have
for the Donut Box podcast and this week we decided to do the same thing except we decided
to talk about where we're at in our careers and how we got there you know because each
person has a story you ask anybody about their career and how they got there and man is some
is some twists and turns but you know what as millennials it's a little different like
even I talked to the generations before me and their struggles were not the same as our
struggles and so I don't know figured be kind of fun to talk about kind of the crazy journey
it takes in the world of jobs because everybody's pretty much got to have one right and I know
we both had some crazy experiences.
It's true well Micah has always wanted to be one thing ever since ever since I've known
them so I'm going to let you just open up about your story I'm going to let you go ahead
and blaze that trail tell what you want to tell I mean I'll ask you some questions but
the spotlight is yours my friend.
Yeah man alright so we'll start like Chris said when I was very very young actually
at the age of four just about to turn five my parents my father was in the military and
so we went over to Germany we got stationed over there and one of the biggest things
that I remember about Germany is we would go to Frankfurt Airport and now this was pre
9-11 and I'm I don't know if you could do it now of course I haven't been back to Germany
since but there used to be this observation deck where you would be able to you know see
I knew it was outdoors so think about it you can walk through the terminal next to all
the gates with all the planes then you walk out there and there was a little playground
for kids but it was pretty much as glass paneled and you can just see everything that's going
on and the big thing at the time was the double decker 747s right like that was the big icons
I mean they were double-decker planes it's pretty that's pretty crazy and so in fact
I've got a tattoo of that same plane on my arm because that was one of the first planes
I remember seeing and made me fall in love with it because this observation deck was
so close you could see in the cockpit you could see what the guys were doing right and
what a what a big mighty machine and it's like these guys get to go and fly it every
day and that's their job you know they get paid to do that what that sounds fun fun
as ever right and so that's what I wanted to do that's what I wanted to do ever since
a really young age you know and Chris and I even talked about it you know fast forward
a few years and we moved to Augusta where I've met Chris and everything like that and one
of my first birthday parties was at Daniel Field there in town and it was flying planes
actually I used to take flight lessons out there and and I was a really different time
back then flight lessons actually weren't very expensive back then I remember it being
about seventy five dollars a lesson which I don't I don't know would you consider Chris
two thousand and four two thousand and five seventy five dollars every two weeks incredibly
expensive I don't think I think it's comparable to what it would be now I think I don't think
it's super expensive for every two weeks definitely a lot to drop on some lessons but I mean you
got to think I don't know how much my parents paid for piano lessons but to put your kid
in anything you know it's going to cost you some money you know nowadays just to give you
a ballpark figured nowadays it's about two hundred dollars an hour to take a flight lesson
so it's it's quite a bit more but I mean of course there was inflation and all that good
jazz but back in the day it was seventy five dollars a lesson and I would take lessons
once every two weeks and then at certain times of my life it became and actually I only took
lessons for about eight months total so it wasn't incredibly long but it kind of scaled
back to like once a month at some times then once every two weeks it kind of just depended
on where the or my parents finances were I guess well let me ask you this question when
did they ever tell you okay this is going to be the last flight lesson or did it just
stop or did they ever have a conversation with you about why no more flight lessons just
kind of unpack all that yeah so why we stopped was actually it was actually told because
it wasn't doing very well in school so I had really bad grades and pretty much I was told
that you know because you had bad grades you're going to stop realistically that's not what
was going on in my family just was having financial issues at the time and they just
use that as a bargaining chip to try to get me to get better grades but they always use
that though they always use hey you're not doing good in school so we're going to take
this away it was always that sort of thing it was the cable TV right in what's funny
is now that I'm an adult I see that that coincided with the football season right so when football
season was over every February right after the Super Bowl it's like okay cable's getting
taken away and it's because you have bad grades right but you know what ended up happening
fast forward a few years later I get into middle school and well let's go back one more
thing before we fast forward all the way to that point so I stopped flying lessons and
I never resumed them as a child so it was a very it was a stint of about six to eight
months but in that six to eight months I did have that birthday party where a few kids
came and Chris got to fly the plane while he was there too which was a pretty crazy
experience for kids I'm you know I can only imagine that was pretty nuts yeah it was like
a little Cessna plane I wasn't no it wasn't huge yeah it was a little like yeah little
prop plane and I think I mean we took like 20 minute rides around town and the only thing
I really remember about those lessons man is I wasn't old enough to do anything right
like that was the main problem was okay I knew how to fly got the basics down everything
like that but in order to take any sort of exam in order to pass your private pilot certification
you have to be 16 or older so I was eight or nine so it was like okay that's a great
start but we really can't do anything for another eight nine years right you know seven
eight years and so what ended up happening there for a while was my flight and started
to be like all right what do you want to do today and there was a little airport that
was over in South Carolina because where we were at was really close to South Carolina
it was just right over the river and so I would say it was really cool to me because
it was a neighborhood that was surrounded or that surrounded a runway right it's an
airport community so basically the whole neighborhood is centered around a little airport and so
but they would allow you to come and fly in there as long as you would you know make your
normal radio calls to them and so it's like man let's go over to I don't remember what
it was like it was like twin oaks or something like that it's like let's go over there for
the day and so pretty much that's what we would do is we would go over there do touch
and goes over there I would be like wow these houses are big and then we would go we would
go back an hour flight lesson an hour is nothing when you're when you're flying by the way
like because of everything that you have to do just landing and taking off an hour is
only like two or three landing and take off even if you're in the pattern right even if
you're just going around in circles and just landing and taking off so you practice landing
like did you get it all to where you could land and take off all by yourself or was where
they still helping no I got to where I was doing it by myself it was to the point where
like my instructor would bring a newspaper and be like do whatever you want pretty much
like I mean it was it was down pat like he would tell me all the time you know I wish
you were of age because you could totally take the test right now the oral exam and
because I had been through the ground school and everything and so it was I don't know
man I'll tell you this much kids at that age I remember him telling my folks really distinctly
to he was like I love teaching kids this age eight nine years old because he's like they're
fearless he's like you tell him to crank it 40 degrees they're gonna crank it 40 degrees
you know adults they're so timid with everything kids are not timid and he he would just pump
me up all the time in fact that was one of the main problems I had right towards the
end I had like two lessons at the end that first instructor got a job somewhere else
I had a couple of lessons towards the end where it was a new instructor and he was not
like that like he was very rigid he was very by the book he wouldn't let me do whatever
I wanted to do pretty much like it wasn't get there and okay what do you want to do
today it's like okay we need to practice our steep turns and you remember Chris how you
were talking about in the elementary school you would get kind of bored with the lessons
that happens same thing it's like bro we did steep turns and figure eight snow is crap last
week like I don't want to do this again and it's like did I not do a good enough job and
he's like oh no you did great I think we just you know need to keep practicing and I'm just
like bro this is so boring like I want to do more I want to do spins and stuff right
like I want to do some I want to do some crazy fun stuff and but you know then it stopped
anyways fast forward middle school wise you know I still I still wanted to really really
big like crossed over from elementary to middle school and you know a lot of things change
but I think middle school was the time that I started a lot of people wanted me to go
to college and I was talking about college in theory and I really liked the idea mainly
for athletics but I think middle school was the time where it's like man I don't know
if I want to go to college like I started seeing that there was a pathway that I didn't
potentially have to go to college to be a pilot what was it about college that made
you not want to go I don't know man it just it just didn't peak my interest like it just
school has never been something that I thoroughly enjoy some people absolutely enjoy it and
that's fantastic I think for me a lot of the idea of school and a lot of the idea of tests
and the way that they conduct it's not really indicative you can be very book smart and do
great in school you can be smart in other ways and do terrible in school and the only
benchmark that they have is are you book smart or not and the thing is it's sure you can
know that knowledge but I feel like for me I'm way more of a hands-on learner and so
school is just not a very good thing like science class was okay but it's because there's more
hands-on things but what did I not like about that you have to write reports and all this
other crap with it I mean that's just life you have to do some of those things but I
just didn't like the format and I didn't like I got way too many bad grades that I'm sitting
here going but I understand the material just because you made a test and you made you know
math in particular and you made it to the point where you were trying to trick kids
and it's and it's like well if you knew the material you'd be able to see the trick in
the trick question and things like that but that's not the point if it wasn't a trick
did I get the entire thing right well yeah okay so you're telling me I don't know what
I'm talking about even though you're the one that tried to trip me up with this I kind
of stand what they're trying to do that stuff irks me do I understand the material or not
not do I understand your tricks on top of the material but you have to also think to
at middle school you don't know what college is like and so you probably were thinking
hey college is just like high school when in reality it's not so college is a lot different
than high school so you're probably going into it like man I hate high school so I'm
going to hate college too which I'm not I'm not judging you I'm not saying right or wrong
I'm just trying to kind of give our listeners perspective right no absolutely but I did
know this I did know in middle school and especially high school that my grades were
going to start to matter so middle school not so much right but high school once you
cross over into high school that's when everything matters that's where your grade point average
is kept and you know you have four years to make colleges want you if that's the case
but not just that you know I'm sitting here thinking if I don't go to college I need to
make sure my GPA is fantastic because you know with somebody hire a even a flight instructor
who has a very low high school GPA who graduated high school but then there's a college grad
out there who has better grade you know especially as an initial job that's the way you have
to think about it but you know careers and things changed so much that's how we were
conditioned to think but then when we got to the job and you know in the real world
it's actually not like that but we'll talk about that in a bit but that was when I kind
of felt it shifting and then high school wise it was the same thing they try to push me
into going to a Georgia high school or Georgia college I was like nah man I really don't want
to do that and I saw the pathway of you know what I can just do a flight school get the
hours that I need and I can go fly it's about the experience not about the college.
Oh high school guidance counselors hate that boy they hate that because their whole job
is to get you to go to college like that is their whole job they hate that.
That's the whole thing and understandably so again this is where our education system
is flawed in the United States why is that it's because the curriculum is focused on
trying to get you to college because that's the numbers that they look at they look at
test scores and they look at how many kids are going to college from your school and
that's how funding is allocated and so they want more kids to go to college because that
means my high school is going to get more and I can pump it up in the community because
obviously you can charge people more taxes if your schools are great right so it's a
whole it's a that's a whole another podcast right there but what I will say is that's
where a lot of contention came from between me and my parents they wanted me to go to
college really bad and I did not want to I did not want to and so fast forward to graduating
from high school we moved out to Texas my senior year so I spent my last senior year
and so at this point I we had just moved to to love it and I had found a flight school
I graduated from high school the only flight school in town I go there and I take a lesson
on my own dime because at this point I was working boot corral right and so I was making
money as a salesman and so I took a lesson on my own my father got pissed he got so mad
he's like you know what this is essentially your college you need to be you know I need
to pay for this I need to pay for this I waited for him to pay for it it never came and then
it never happened at that point he never he never wanted he never went to pay for it fast
forward a little bit I get a lot of pressure because I'm still living in their house at
this time I keep taking lessons on the side and you're paying for all of it right when
I and I was paying for it I was also going to ground school all over again because you
got to think I did all this stuff when I was eight nine years old that doesn't count anymore
like there's a certain there's a certain amount of time if you haven't flown in between the
FAA don't count that time like they'll count it as just like basic hours but the complex
different things that I did like I did a you know I did a solo at one point they they
wouldn't let any of that happen so it's like okay essentially I had to start from scratch
for the most part and so I'm going through this and I remember the biggest fight that
we had is I paid for ground school again and ground school was $400 but it's an eight week
course which is actually pretty cheap if you think about it's an eight week course and
it's very in depth like it's very in depth it's it is very cheap you know I pay I pay
the $400 and I remember he was just like you know if you just want to piss your life away
you can and whatever and I'm just like what are you talking about like I'm going for what
I'm what I want to do like I thought this is what we've always talked about because he
was always pretty supportive about you know me flying and things like that and but he
was upset that I wasn't going to college at the same time and so to play Kate because
of course I'm living with him I start going to South Plains I remember that and you hated
it you hated it I could not stand South Plains College I couldn't stand it you just were
like I don't know I'd be like how's classes and you you just seem like you were in a bad
mood and you were pissed about it but I didn't know that background so it makes sense now
like hearing you talk about it why you were upset because the fact that your parental
paternal unit was on your case about it and saying that you were you know peeing your
life away and all that good stuff when in reality you just weren't doing it his way and that's
what he was mad about exactly well and the other part about it too was was was he paying
for South Plains no I paid that with bootcrow money I had to pay for that now granted South
Plains was not that much that's why it wasn't a big deal at the time it was like $1,100
for the semester it really wasn't that much money for college so and I was getting all
my basics right and so I was like well I'll just get this degree and whatever in fact
it's like what he wanted me to do he wanted me to go through South Plains get my get my
community college what is that called associates degree there you go he wanted me to get my
associates then he wanted me to go over to tech for a year and then potentially apply
for the Air Force Academy because he heard that that's an easier way to get into it
than going through high school wise because he always wanted me to go to the Air Force
Academy to go to the fight program through there and I didn't want to go to the Air Force
that was a whole thing too I did not want to go to the Air Force the only reason that
that was ever an entertainment is you know of course if you go through the Air Force
yeah you're set up for forever as a pilot like you never not have a job I mean you're
set up but the thing is I don't want to get shot at I don't want to be in war zones I
don't want any of that like I like I like leisure flying that's what I like to do I didn't
want to be any apart of that and you know I even had to take the as fab or whatever the
Air Force one was like I was pushed into doing that and it was I would probably have to take
it again because I only scored high enough to be a navigator so I wouldn't even have
scored high enough to be a pilot that was the other part about it and so it was just
it was a whole big thing anyways I start going to South Plains College you know I'm sitting
here like what am I doing with my life you know all this money I could be I could be
out there with you know having hours because I was working and going to college so I didn't
really have time to go fly like at that point I didn't know by the way I had a really toxic
girlfriend too at the time yeah there was a lot of factors at that time that we're just
making everything bad you know you had a toxic girlfriend your paternal unit was forcing you
to do this your bet your best friend was kind of on the outs I mean it it was all just a
bad it was just a bad time of life so I can I can kind of see why you were a little frustrated
yeah it was it was a whole it was a whole thing anyways fast forward so we keep going
and I break up with that toxic ex Chris and I were no longer friends for a little bit
and I meet my now wife and at this point I was just working bootcrow I was just working
bootcrow was not taking flight lessons the first time or bootcrow the second bootcrow
the second time this is bootcrow the second time so I quit bootcrow once and then I came
back they begged me to come back like they were like we can sign paperwork right now
and I was working this other job I needed to work in two jobs for a while and then bootcrow
was more money so I just went back over there but I met my wife at bootcrow and so I meet
her and she was only going to be there for a few months so she goes back down to where
I'm living right now and you know at that time what made me stop flying wasn't just
that but when I was dating that gal beforehand I couldn't really fly then because all my
money was tied up with her so then what happens after we broke up that flight school closed
then there was no flight school in Lubbock so there was nowhere to go fly so the whole
reason that I was too like when when my wife came back here I said you know what I'm going
to go back with her because it's a major area there's plenty of flight schools down there
that was part of the reason I came down here too was like you know what I'm going to I'm
going to go to flight school I even so fast forward my parental units come down to see
these flight schools and I'm skipping a whole part of my life but this is because of time
or do you think I should just make this whole podcast about this freaking story just make
it all about the story man we can do we can do my part we'll do my part part two we'll
do that another episode but but just tell a full story I meet my wife and all that good
jazz when I met my wife the plan was and this was another conjured up plan there was a school
that was nearby my grandparents my my father's parents it was in Longview Texas in Longview
Texas or out on the freaking border of Louisiana it might as well be Louisiana.
Latterno Christian something something a really small private Christian school and I mean to
the point where I took a tour all this stuff and my mother was saying oh yeah this is where
you're going to meet your future wife and blah blah blah blah blah like God told me
and I'm like yeah okay we'll see about all that and I didn't end up going there because
we get all the way into it like I'm talking we would did parents weekend everything and
we get there I get my D card printed and we get into the financial aid office and they
slap that piece of paper down and you know how much it said on there for a semester for
the first semester 40 grand now 64,500 dollars and I you know my father just about choked
I don't know why I guess none of us looked at the tuition I thought that we had an understanding
but you know what ended up happening so I had like bought a kayak with my buddy like
beforehand and like all this other stuff my father told me you have to sell everything
like if if you're going to go here you have to put skin in the game so you have to sell
everything and that included my bed.
Let's just pause for a right second now what Micah is leaving out is the fact that he was
under the impression or had the thought that he had a college fund right his parental units
told him that he had a college fund and they have been setting money aside for him well
they blew that college fund.
Yeah apparently that's my that's my little insert that's why you had to sell everything
because they didn't have any money.
Yeah I didn't have didn't have that and so it was like in order for us to make this happen
like we're you're gonna have to sell everything and so that included my bed like I remember
we had a whole yard sale and you remember those adjustable beds that we had Chris yeah
both the medical bed medical beds yeah they sold the pair of those for a thousand bucks
and I remember the yard sale it was like it was not nearly enough right I mean you're
talking about sixty some odd thousand dollars right there's no way that you can raise that
off of a freaking yard sale and so we kind of stalled and stalled and so the the university
called and was like yeah we need that payment and it was like yeah we're gonna have to defer
to the next semester and I mean they knew what that meant bro they knew what that meant
I remember they they didn't even call us the next semester they just withdrew me like they
didn't even they didn't even freaking call and so that ended up happening and so fast
forward meet my wife right and then it's like okay we're gonna go down to at the time it
was San Marcos Texas and there's a few flight schools in the area I toured them and what
else is in San Marcos Texas Texas State University right and that's where my wife was going so
I was like heck yeah I'll just go to Texas State and I'll fly on the side there was even
a extension service Texas State Aviation to where you can go to Texas State and get your
and it was pretty affordable actually since I was in state every and it was on public
university right the only thing was they didn't have any degrees that were tailored specifically
for aviation and that was the whole point of contention between me and my me and my father
with that deal was I'm not gonna pay for this because it's stupid because you would have
to get a business degree or something else because that was the whole thing it was like
I'll get a business degree or they have a great business school or a marketing degree
or something universal and here was my here was my defense to that the aviation industry
and I've been studying this since I was five years old because I've generally had a lot
of access to the internet it has its ebbs and flows it always has and when the getting's
good the getting's good and when it's not it's not and the thing is I've worked for
airports I've worked for airlines I've worked as a fueler I've done these things and at
that point in my life I'm going bro I need a backup plan in life if if the economy tanks
and all the airlines you know every pilot's gonna be out on their keyster and it doesn't
matter how good of a pilot you are there's not enough to go around and it's kind of what
I was talking about before you know who gets the cream of the crop is the Air Force guys
is the guys with a lot of experience things like that right those are the guys that get
picked up the rest of them I mean the the big recession that happened 2008 there was
guys that went from flying and had been flying for 20 years to working at McDonald's because
they had no backup plan so it's like I studied that and was like I'm not going to be one
of those guys like I'm not going to be naive because my father's whole perspective was
well if you're a good enough pilot like you'll always have a job and it's like yeah I don't
buy that for a second you're at the industry's mercy it's it's not anything that you can
do and so my that was and I mean I remember sitting there and we had a whole heated discussion
my future wife was sitting there at the table too and I had printed out all the different
degree programs that I can do and do the aviation program I can't buy flying on the side and
it's all one lump sum of money and by the end of it he told me the same thing I'm not
going to pay for you to piss your life away it was the same thing he told me like not
going to do it so just so I'm so I'm clear you were in favor of you still wanted to go
to Texas State get your degree in something else besides aviation while still doing aviation
on the side and you were like hey I might get my degree in let's just use finance for example
you're like hey I'm going to get a finance degree but still do aviation but I still want
to go to school and stuff pretty much yeah I was still going to play Kate that whole
side because at this point I'm still under the impression that they're going to pay for
it so it's like sure if that's the stipulation sure I'll go to college I even found a better
solution think about that I found that solution I found the solution where it's college and
flying all in one for a cheap price in state and the answer was still no because it's not
aviation specific as a degree.
Yeah well what's crazy is really reality you didn't really know this until later on down
the road but they weren't going to pay for any of it so I mean they weren't going to
pay for any of it so here's what ended up happening so fast forward some more time and
at this point my my parents we had been you know up and down for a while and I was I was
already kind of considering this was like 2016 and I was 23-24 I think at the time right
no no 2021-22 something like that and I was already starting to think about it like man
I don't know if I want to associate with them anymore because of some of the things that
have been happening and you know some of these lies that have been happening and what ended
up happening from there I get a call and mind you this is this was from their end my father
calls me and he says I want to pay for your flight school like I've got some extra money
I got some you know some means that we can do it I want you to find the flight school
like we'll talk about it and we'll go with it and he was just talking about the flight
school not college too and I'm sitting here going okay well you know I'm still open to
the college option right and it's like no no no just the flight school and so I found
a flight school and he was like and again the whole answer was like no not going to
do it I hear from my family he's telling everybody else no I'm not going to pay for
your school he needs to go through the school of hard knocks and he needs to know what it's
like to go through it rough but on the other end he's telling me like I'm going to pay
for it find the school and what would end up happening is he's just like no no this
school is sketchy that's the whole thing that would happen it's like no no this school is
just this is not reputable like it's not a reputable school I can tell like it's just
not reputable and it's it's like what's not reputable about it and it's like well and
then it became there's no college associated to it the ones you were showing me before
the college was associated with it and it's like I thought that's not what we wanted though
I thought that's what you were saying we don't want so I found this other flight school because
he'd listen don't you know him don't show him something twice I couldn't take him back
to Texas State that wouldn't have worked so the deal is I had to find somewhere else
so I found another place and I made up my mind though I made up my mind I said I this time
whether he pays for it or not I need to do something with my life I got to jump I like
this flight school I'm gonna start regardless like I'll find the money I'll find the money
and same thing he's like oh no this is jank this is stupid and so I said all right fine
so I started to flight school I scraped up the cash the only problem was this school
was geared towards getting you to be a commercial pilot like that's the whole premise and they
required you to take at least three hours of flying a week which was seven hundred dollars
a week that's how much it was so and that's to do the bare minimum if you fall below that
like you like they kick you out of school pretty much so I was having to pay seven hundred
dollars a week well at the time I had to take a night job because obviously I'm flying during
the day and when you're not flying you're in a classroom so I took a night job at Amazon
stalking shelves and doing things like that for 12 hours overnight and I think we've talked
about that before it was a terrible job and I was doing that while I was flying but I
was spending it seven hundred dollars a week plus rent everything else bro it did not last
long I racked up a lot of debt about ten thousand dollars actually worth of debt in a very short
amount of time and so it was it was really and I had to I had to stop because something
else that was bad to the flight school the instructor that I had he was a former Marine
and he was a dick like he was not a nice guy at all and so he was very much like what are
you some kind of little girl like all this other stuff like he would he would talk to
you like that while you're flying and that is not the environment you want to be in especially
when you're flying a flying machine and you're learning how to do it and also they they just
assume that I knew what I was doing because I used to do it when I was like eight or nine
bombing in my twenties now you know like it's different you need to show me again it was
a whole it was a bad situation I was paying seven hundred dollars a week for it and so
it didn't last long and I ended up getting out of it well at my at my final hour right
it's like I I you know talk to my folks and this time they were serious and this time
they were real serious about about paying for flight school and everything and so I was
like okay and this time my father said you know what I found I even found a flight school
for you like check this place out and guess what flight school it was it was the flight
school I was already going to and he was like he was like yeah I think this one's legit
everything and I said great I've been going to that one for about four months now but
you had showed him that one before right I did and he said that it was jankin stupid
and like and wasn't reputable and all that other good jazz and so ended up I we ended
up talking with two people because there was a college that was attached to it I was just
doing the flight program I wasn't doing the because I couldn't afford the college part
I can only afford the flying part and so we were going to do both so I had the college
person on the line and I also had the the head of the school on the line very nice guy like
very nice guy very helpful my father was an ass like he embarrassed a crap out of me like
I don't think I've ever been more embarrassed in my entire life he went through there and
he he basically told them that they weren't reputable and that they were con men and tell
me how you're not con men like tell me how you're not and like went through this whole
freaking thing man and I had to go back I had to go back and fly there and guess who guess
who didn't pay guess who didn't pay yeah they didn't they didn't end up paying man and so
again because it wasn't reputable and all this other crap but meanwhile again they're
telling everybody so did you get stuck with the bill oh I got stuck with the bill it took
me a while I had to pay that $10,000 worth of debt off tell you that much pretty much
what ended up happening after that is there was one other time and the last time really
really hurt I had kind of smoothed out you know I had gotten out of fight school I had
a couple jobs at the time and I was managing my debt and I was you know just just working
you know sometimes you get into a point in life man and I know you've been there before
where you're just like man this is my time to grind I guess this is the time to work
this is the time to I don't know what that was supposed to be teaching me but we'll figure
it out and we'll get out of this debt and so that was the main focus was just work work
work and get out of this debt and so I got a call and at this point I had a friend who
was working for my dad and that'll come into the equation here in a minute but my father
calls again he says hey so we want to try this fight school thing again he said he came
into into some money and you know it's like and this time it was like $50,000 $60,000
and like we can we can like pay for the whole thing right and I was like okay well maybe
this is maybe this is it right like you know they've never talked like this before and
then what ends up happening is and that was the whole conversation and it was to the previous
flight school they're like you know what maybe we can talk to the previous flight school
I really liked them whatever and then I get a call from this friend of mine who was working
for for the guy at the time and what does he tell me he goes dude your dad just bought
a Porsche isn't that so awesome and I was like what are you talking about and he's like dude
he bought a Porsche like he bought a Porsche isn't that like he didn't tell you and I was
like no he didn't tell me and this was the the day after he told me about the fight school
deal and so I'm going I knew bro I already knew I was like there there went my flight
school that Porsche was my flight school and sure enough man he was like yeah well we just
we just can't do that anymore like we can't really afford to do that anymore from how
quick that phone call where he said hey I'm gonna play pay for your sorry pay for your
flight school to you find out that he has a he has a Porsche cuz I mean just just just
playing devil's advocate maybe you're like oh maybe they can afford both they got some
money and I don't know walk us through that less than 24 hours the fact that he didn't
call me first I know that guy that guy would have been so excited and especially you know
I'm a son I'm his only son by the way and a lot of times what would happen if he if
he's excited about anything heck when he kicked my mom out he was excited about his new girlfriend
called me up too so I tell you this much he calls you when he's excited about stuff the
fact that that man didn't call me about that Porsche but everybody else knew that was my
fight school I already knew I was like I he didn't even have to tell me I already knew
you can feel it you can feel it in the moment I called him to how awkward he was I knew
it's like he wasn't excited on the phone he was he was awkward he knew what he knew I
knew so have we gotten to the part where you went to the shady flight school or is that
coming up with shady flight school well is it there one that you were like you you went
to the flight school and then you just showed up one day and they weren't that was basically
like a ditch town thing or am I making that up no so that did happen that didn't happen
to me though that happened to a bunch of other people oh okay well never mind so what it does
it does play into that and I'll just break it down for those of you who don't know about
taking flying lessons and things like that it's not like even if it's attached to a college
financing is very very weird when it comes to doing that you have to basically pay for
it out of pocket or private loans because used to the feds and fast food and all those folks
where you can get student loans from they used to fund flight schools to until one day they
had a school that basically did what Chris was talking about they enrolled about 60
people and all of them had prepaid with student loans and things like that or even grants and
things the school was fake so they skip town with millions of dollars of federal money and after
that they're like okay well it's too easy for those for flight schools to be a con school for us
to send our money over there so we're not going to fund them anymore so now basically the only
thing that you can do to fund flight school which is expensive is to get a private loan or a GI
bill and so it's like if you're if you're in the military and you have the GI bill that's great
it'll pay for it same thing if you know but other than that you basically have to get a private
loan or have lots of money to be able to do it. So then after after all that right there was no
more talk about paying for school no more talk about any of that right? No that didn't that
didn't happen after that there was no more talk after the porch happened there was no more talk
about that in fact they bought a really really big house it was like a six bedroom there was
three stories it was freaking massive they went on a freaking spending spree after that I am and
so what ended up happening though is shortly thereafter give it a few years I I'd stop talking
to them I wish it was a little different but at the same time when people do that kind of stuff
to you I don't care who they are I learned some things in life these people can call you their
parents you know say they're parents and you know I love and respect them and what not as far as
for who they were and for the things that they've done for me but for the people they choose to be
I have zero respect for that and the bottom line is if you can't trust the person if you have no
trust for the person you don't have a relationship and how can you trust somebody like that's what
I just told you this little tale is a small snippet of everything that's happened like that's
that's that's tip of the iceberg that's not even that's not even in-depth at all there's so much
more to it but you know a lot of people would say you should stop talking to them for that you
know for the fact that they pulled the rug out for me that many times and I just want to reiterate
one more thing about this story too what I'm mad about with that whole situation and what I'm mad
with them about what that whole situation is it's not about the fact that they didn't pay for my
flight school if they wanted me to go through hard knocks that's fine but that's not what they were
telling me that's not what they were telling me if you tell me you're gonna do something I expect
that because I'm one that's very much on promises and I will come through on mine but I expect you
to come through on yours again it's like you said it's a whole tip of the iceberg type deal and
there's more stuff to get into but I think the bottom line was you promised me these things and
you didn't fall through but yet if I would have fall through all my promises you would have you
would have punished me you would have you would have just given me the riot act you would have
been horrible to me because he was very big about you need to make sure you fulfill your
commitments like he preached out a lot and a lot of what he preached was the opposite of what he
did and he would he would harp on you about certain things but I think that's kind of maybe what
you're trying to hit the nail on the head is like hey you preached all this of following through
on your commitments and you you you drilled that into my head and then you failed on your
commitments and you I mean it's not just that one incident but there's a whole bunch of incidents
and you know a lot of what I'm talking about it's I'm in a weird place because have I forgiven
them for all that stuff yes but you know what you can't forget a lot of this stuff that's what a
lot of people don't understand a lot of people don't understand that if you just allow I would it
would be easier to forget if they're trying to change themselves or if they're trying to better
themselves but none of that's happening none of that's happened at all in fact I never received
an apology for any of this well there's a lot of things that they did that you haven't received
an apology for but it what it comes down to they're not sorry so that's that's that's what it comes
down to and it's unfortunate but at the same time to finish this out what mainly where what's
going on now so where I'm at my career now I went into the IT field because you know sometimes in
life it's not what you know it's who you know and I knew more people in the IT field when I first
got into at the time now my work ethic has has made a name for myself in the industry a little bit
not like made a name for yourself like people know who you are anything but at least within my
company with the at least within my department things like that I could go a few different places
and my options are open if that makes sense I was about to say and to end it on a happy note you
were doing last week in aviation where you have a whole show about the news and the current events
and all that good stuff so what's what's all happening I believe that that show is going to
get us to the point where where we can fly all the time and you know make my dream come through
that way or it makes us so much money I buy my own plane there you have it ladies and gentlemen see
I wanted to put a happy end in on it there's there's again there's a whole no for sure just one layer
of the onion that we we pull back there's there's a lot of layers to this onion but I wanted to
end it on a happy note for sure yeah no for sure one other happy note is the whole reason for IT is
so I can make the money to go back into aviation my dreams not dead I'm just taking a little detour
sometimes you have to work sometimes you have to work and do things and toil that you you know
and things you don't necessarily want to do in order to get to your dreams and that's going to make
that all the more sweeter when I'm when I'm flying so it's coming it's just you know sometimes you
take a little bit of a detour to get there and so stay tuned to the Donut Box podcast give it a few
years and man you'll hear me flying I'll be I'll be hitting my dream well for sure and we we want
you guys to go check check that out on YouTube last week in aviation that's the title of it last
week in aviation so you guys check those videos out find us at trash can network on all the socials
we're not on tiktok and we're not on twitter or x because that just starts a whole bunch of fights
and we're trying to spread positive no elon and no china no elon and no china um for for those of
you don't know your data is being sold by everybody but especially by tiktok so you don't want to do
that well uh I think it's been a great episode uh thanks for thanks for opening up and sharing that
part of your life and sharing all the details and all that good stuff yeah apparently we need two
hours for it because I'm like man there's so much I just thought about that was a very brief synopsis
of that whole story yeah for sure man well uh I think it's time to pick this doughnut box out
of the train all right man why am I good and this has been the doughnut box podcast