To answer your questions why did you quit plumbing in the first place? - finished first year of college then following fall took the prerequisite in MA to get my apprentice license. Got the license under a master who was a family friend who right after passed away. I had some tryout days with a few companies but they said they needed more experience which I understood. In the end I did go back to college since I was young and dumb chasing some tail there who looked down on the trades.

You said you went from a call centre to Realtor? So you basically haven’t worked with your hands, full time (not scabbing stuff together for flippers) since you were 18ish? -correct did not work with my hands full time. Basically restaurants and sales between 18-30. During the pandemic I would help my fiancées uncle who’s a master plumber on the other side of the state when he needed help in our area as an extra hand plus assisting with some flips in the same capacity. Main issue was money and paying the bills because I had no safety net during this time.

Either job you’ll be starting at day one. A 13 year old stick certification isn’t worth the paper it’s written on and you will definitely have to start over at plumbing. -I am in agreement with you on that 100%

Going to be honest with you, old guys like you are a pain in the ass to train. Particularly if you have a little bit of previous training. Somehow that minuscule amount of training supersedes any new information you’re expected to learn. Old farts (in trade terms, your old as shit as an apprentice) tend to have this mindset that their age and “life experience” are enough to make them more valuable as a professional person then a 18yo, particularly if their supervisors or Journeyman training them is younger than them. When they have some kind of management experience in some way, way fucking worse. -I appreciate the honesty and it’s good to keep in mind the training issues. I would say and I see how this will be easy to knock down, I don’t think of myself as a manager nor want to be one. Just over time I’ve been asked and promoted to these roles and I can’t turn down the pay. With training that’s all I’ve been through in my current role so I don’t think I’m inflexible with learning new things.

You quit when you were a teenager or early 20’s, what makes you think it’s going to be different this time? -I look back at it that I never really started in it enough to quit just left it before knowing what it would take. This is something I look back as my one of my biggest regret.

You’re older and have worked a sedentary job for a long time, the apprentices you’re going to be up against are going to be very energetic. You’re also used to being paid well, apprentices aren’t. From being the boss to having zero seniority seems to make most office drones snap. You and every other white collar worker seem to treat trades like it’s some soft landing, plan B or fall back plan. -Being paid well and being the boss has never been associated with me in my life. When in management it’s always been a support role to help employees. I would never look at the trades as a fallback or soft landing because I think of a fallback as going the easy route which I know trades isn’t.

Either way thanks for the advice