Like all of you, we never took on debt when borrowing money without first projecting the financial burden those obligations presented, and we certainly did not borrow beyond our ability to pay back the loan(s).
Before starting my career in the mechanical trades, I attended college for two years, mainly because my parents and, quite frankly, society expected it. In the early 1970s, society looked down its collective noses at mechanical trades as menial labor unworthy of an elevated status. Students who attended votech schools while completing high school fared no better with respect to respect for their chosen field of study. When I quit college, due mostly to being a square peg trying to fit in a round hole, I had a 4.0 in my major of psychology. I just could not see myself as a shrink: “Zo, tell me vat ails you?” I literally stumbled into PHVAC work by happenstance. I didn’t follow my passion, it found me! Looking back, I would do it all over again.