Did I Get My Just Desserts?

When I think back to how I started out in IT as a career, I realise that the idea began during my 'self-study' career lessons. But what is an absolute mystery to me, even now, is why I seemed to be so obsessed with considering IT as a career almost exclusively, when there were so many other options open to me.

In the sixth form, most of my friends either did four 'proper' A levels or three plus the boringly pointless 'General Studies'. I was in  the minority, doing A levels in just three subjects, so I had a lot more 'free periods' than most of my mates.

This led to me having a double free period immediately before lunch on Wednesday, and I usually just sat around in the sixth form common room drinking coffee and smoking, while I waited for lunchtime to arrive. After being spotted numerous times by the sixth form head, I was 'persuaded' that it would be somewhat more constructive to use that particular bit of my spare time for 'careers' purposes. 

The member of staff who was in charge of careers was a young teacher who'd gone from school to sixth form college, to university, to teacher training college and then back to school, so he was clearly qualified to give advice on finding jobs, but he was only available for the first period, so I would spend the second period alone in the careers section of the school library, going through various career related documents.

I'd already decided that I didn't intend to go on to university (which was a good thing, considering the grades I ended up with,) so I concentrated on careers I could start out in from the age of 18. The careers section of the school library consisted of two bookshelves, filled with ring-binders for various careers; each binder would be filled with details of careers in a particular field.

Now I could have chosen many different career binders to study, but the one I went for more times than the rest was the one covering IT jobs. Why I tended to choose that one in particular, I've no idea; the subject didn't particularly fascinate me, and the content of the binder was no more interesting than any of the others, but that was the one I always seemed to end up with. When the time arrived, since I'd studied the ins & outs of an IT career in quite a lot of depth, IT seemed like a natural career path to follow.

I often wonder why I chose that particular binder, and I don't remember ever deliberately choosing it at all. What I do remember though, is looking forward to lunch and thinking about how particularly hungry I was at the time; I remember how each time I took that binder down from the shelf, for some reason, I had cake and puddings on my mind; I was particularly fond of desserts in those days, and even now, when I think back to choosing that binder, my mind is suddenly reminded of thoughts of puddings, but I've absolutely no idea why.

I remember to this day, standing in front of the shelf each week, determined to study a different career this time, but then the craving for pastry and cream would inexplicably overcome me and I'd take a binder from the shelf seemingly at random, only when I sat down at the table, it always turned out to be 'Professional Career Roles in Information Technology.'

So I'd spend about 45 minutes studying IT careers while my mind was really on thoughts of filling my face with pudding, until eventually the lunchtime bell would sound and at last I could wander off to sate my hunger, but not before replacing the binder in its place on the shelf, with only it's abbreviated title on the spine showing: "Prof.IT.Roles"

Weird isn't it?