As a younger kid, I wanted to be a train driver, like so many other kids; as a teenager, I started playing a musical instrument (electric bass), and wanted to be a rock star. However, I got a bit of a wake-up call when I was about 16, living in South Africa, when I went to a concert: I can't remember the name of the band, but they'd had a couple of number one hits . They looked tired, p-ed off to be playing another gig, and even though it was a medium-sized town there was less than a thousand people there, and the best audience reaction was not to their songs, but to a couple of popular cover tunes. A year later, they were gone; hardly inspiring, and I left school and got a job.
I tell this story because it was an early lesson in how any job, no matter how glamourous, will inevitably become routine. Even touring the world as a rock star, followed by months in a studio recording that "difficult second album"! The people who survive and progress are the ones who learn to moderate their expectations and make long-term plans.
Loving your job also helps, of course. I've watched the careers of musicians like Steve Vai - a Grammy winner who is among the greatest guitarists working today - who still gets a kick out of touring, playing places where few beyond guitar geeks have heard of him - like an air show pilot, he gets his satisfaction from a job well done, less from how fickle people perceive him.
What's the connection with aviation? Well, I sense some disappointment among the pilots here that you're not the "rock stars" of aviation, getting the money and respect to match that. Others are better positioned to talk about the reasons why that is the case - as you have - and even as SLF I'm not exactly happy about it. If you have my safety in your hands, I want you to be as pampered as a rock star - though without the rock star lifestyle. (Sorry, Bruce!)
