I’m mid-forties, and left behind a safe but boring office-based career in my mid thirties.
First flying job was aged 36, flying TPs with a UK regional that sounds suspiciously similar to Desk-pilot’s . . .
Five years there; salary, career prospects and job security not the best, but wonderful experience – fun flying from small bases with great people. It was a working holiday.
I then spent a couple of years in the Middle East, flying mostly at night to some godawful, horrible, scary places. Great money, great experience (with hindsight – it didn’t feel like it at the time) but p!ss-poor quality of life. I couldn’t wait to escape.
Now with a very big UK airline – that sounds suspiciously similar to Desk-Pilots’s . . .
Except that I was fortunate enough to join on a longhaul fleet rather than the minibus. Money is somewhere between the other two, but with much better quality of life, career prospects and job security. For sure I’ve been lucky with timing, but you take your breaks and - to an extent – make your own luck.
And after nearly a decade of airline flying, it still feels like I’m being paid to do my hobby. I can’t think of many jobs like that.