What do I want to do?

Well, the boy is asleep and that gives me a few minutes to think. My son is a handful right now - he was 2 in July. I am a part-time stay at home dad, since last January. Here it is the first of October and I'm still having a hard time adjusting to this role that my wife and I have decided would be mine. I still work a couple days a week. I have operated my own electrical contracting company since early 2002. I now take on small electrical jobs to help with our income and to get me out of the house. Back when the business was running full bore, I had no time to think about if what I was doing was making me happy. It seemed, at the time, like the next logical step (operating my own business). Now, without the hustle and bustle of activity, I'm wondering... do I want to continue on in this line of work? At this point, my job as a stay at home dad will come to an end, eventually. My wife and I don't really forsee any future offspring beyond what we already have. What will I do when the boy starts into all day school? There are many reasons why I don't think I want to continue on in my own business. To me, I've been there - done that, and I don't care to do it again. I have always been like that. With the exception of working with my father, I usually don't stay in the same job for longer than 2-3 years. I get bored easily when I have accomplished something. When I ran my own business though, I never really came to realize my full potential. I am a great electrician but, when it came to the business end, I lacked the knowledge and ruthlessness that it took to become a shrewd business man. So, I can say, I didn't get close to reaching my goals and you know what? I really don't care to try again. Sounds a little like a defeatist attitude. Probably is. I came from a long line of entrepreneurs with relative success stories and I thought I wanted to be like them... but, maybe I don't. It's possible that maybe I do, but in a different profession.

One of my wife's cousins gave me the inspiration to create a blog. He has recently begun documenting some of his family history on video. His mother's parents are still alive and full of stories dating back to their youth in Cuba. This last summer my grandmother passed away and it really got me thinking about all the good times I had with my grandparents. What a wealth of knowledge. They taught me things that they never intended to. Jim (my wifes cousin) worked with me for a period of time last year. I would tell him crazy stories about my family and he would laugh and say "you need to write this stuff down". So now, I think I'll take his advice.