Regrets, I have a few.

L

liaconn

Registered User
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I'm just wondering how many of you, if you could go back to leaving school all over again, would do the same things with your life?

I would have travelled more, bought a property earlier, and gone into a more creative line of work.
 
Hindsight is 20/20.

I sometimes find it difficult to understand why I didn't travel more when I was younger. Then I rememebered that a return flight to London with Aer Lingus cost about a week's wages. Notions of travel were quickly knocked on the head in those days.

It'd not like now where a year's "time out" is regarded as a right of passage.
 
liaconn said:
I would have travelled more, bought a property earlier, and gone into a more creative line of work.
Click to expand...

+1

Maybe in an alternative world we would have ended up together?

I have compensated though - by travelling as much as I can, when I can and often at the expense of other comforts but a few weeks here and there isn't the same, and it's not the travelling you had in mind I'm sure no matter how less obvious the destinations. I did live outside the country for 4 years so maybe that's one tick.

Property? I'll admit I scoffed at what I saw as the wannabe wide boys aged 19/20 buying their homes in the late 80s - I was too "bohemian" to be tied to a mortgage. Arrogance of youth yes, but it wouldn't have been wholly compatible with travel either I suppose so difficult to have it both ways.

My line of work isn't creative but I am as creative as possible in my spare time with music, art, writing etc.

Things were a bit different then though - I never really felt (rightly or wrongly) that I had the luxury of having a career that I would thoroughly enjoy - to have "a decent job that you didn't hate" was often seen as almost a goal in itself. Maybe it was as much me as the zeitgeist - I dunno, but I do feel that subsequent generations have had much more of a sense of optimism and possibilities instilled into them.
 
I agree with you both, it was a different time. When I left school we were in a recession and everyone was just scrabbling to get secure jobs with a bit of a future to them. I suppose I just envy young people now when I see all of the options available to them and how parents nowadays are much less cynical about people wanting to study media, communications etc. That would have been considered a bit 'arty' and frivolous when I was a school leaver.
Like you, Caveat, I got a bit involved in that world in my free time and, as a result of a couple of successes, got selected for a temporary posting in a more creative area of the public service.

I just wish I'd gone off and lived in the States for a while and taken a bit of a risk workwise. Ah, we were a very sensible generation.
 
I went to Australia when I was 30 and when I seen the lifestyle over there, part of me wished I spent a year travelling around there after I left college.
I'm now saving it for when I retire!
 
I should have taken pictures of the girl I went out with when I was 21!
 
I should have stayed in college for longer and done a Phd before I became tied to responsibilities and a pay packet.

I should have gone for my career of choice (astrophysics) rather than my career of economic necessity (software engineer).

I should have slept around more!!! Discreetly, of course.

I should have travelled more, and worked any old job in fun places.

I maybe should have considered the offer by the NYC cab driver when I was 21 who offered to marry me for 10k so I could get a green card

I should have bought my property before the prices rocketed!!
 
If I had done anything (majorly) different (e.g. went to Oz for a year) then maybe I woun't have met Mrs Firefly so no regrets there. However, a bit more travel would have been good, esp before we had kids.
 
Do you think there has ever been an AAM love affair? Or even simply just an affair!
 
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