Gilding the lily

6/9/12  redacted parts of my "throw away email address" and cell number


Since coming back from Africa I have been NOT writing my resume. While I have written some things, I have in almost equal measure deleted. I mentioned this to someone I'll call Mr. T. who volunteered to bring me some 'good' resumes, properly redacted, that had been submitted to his place of work. I'm not sure this has helped since what I was editing out was tame compared to how these applicants described themselves. To me, telling someone that I'm trustworthy is as unnatural as stomping on a puppy...saying I have integrity, as difficult as eating sand. Who am I to say such a thing about myself, and how should I expect you to believe me? When you drop your welding hood, closing out the world, and it's just you and a puddle of hot metal, it's a good idea to like the you that you find there. Being a man of principals is my ground state of being, to write it all out in black and white seems so put-on, so crass, so affected.

The fact is, I have never gotten a job by means of a resume. When I got my first two construction jobs I was employed mainly on the basis of showing up and being willing to work. The work itself sifted the wheat from the chaff.  I got the last two jobs I've had because the people hiring had know me for years. This selling myself is strange and hard. Maybe I'll just start a 'Mr. Fix It' type business and work for myself. I know I can do the work. Not sure if I'll like the paper work, then again, maybe I can hire that done.  When I was young people used to as what I wanted to be when I grew up. What a silly question. I'm wanted to be ME! I still don't know how I want to make a living so...whattaya got.

In any event, here is something like a resume.

Noel (aka Leon) Carpenter
(214) 445-****
Noel********r@gmail.com

I am trustworthy, honest, conscientious, competent, and hard working with exceptional common sense.
I am ‘handy’- I can understand not only how mechanical things work but often why they don’t. Outside of work I have entirely re-plumed my house and updated both my kitchen and bathroom. The summer before last I built a detached garage for my house.
I enjoy the challenge of learning new skills. While at Copper Craft I learned to TIG weld, spin metal and English wheel because they were more difficult than what I was doing and that interested me.
I am not so hung up on myself that I don’t tell on myself. If I mess up something I’ll tell you rather than try to save face.

1992 Western Nebraska Community College-Sidney campus
     Associate of Applied Sciences-Diesel Engineering

1990 Rift Valley Academy 
     Diploma

Spring of 2011 Six months in Africa.

Fall of 2005. Self employed

Self employed contractor for Emerald Delivery. Most of our work was making ‘hot shot’ air freight deliveries. As a contractor I provided my own car, fuel, insurance and paid my own taxes. The job required:

• being able to work without supervision
• having a car in operational condition
• being trust worthy to handle expensive and fragile packages
• passing a TSA background check
• annually recurring TSA security training 
• an ability to make timely deliveries all over the city and beyond

Fifteen weeks in Africa. Spring 2005

Spring 1996 ARMETCO/Copper Craft (later purchased by Berger Brothers/Euramax)

Sometime in the spring of '96 I changed companies to ARMETCO doing much the same thing as Metal Systems.
Beginning in July '97 I moved into the ARMETCO shop unit, Copper Craft. At Copper Craft I started in shipping and worked my way up to:

• CNC table router operator
• TIG/MIG welder
• fabricator producing many custom, one off products
• metal spinning 
• shot bag and English wheel fabrication

January 1993 Metal Systems Inc

In January '93 I moved form Nebraska to the D/FW area and began working for Metal Systems Inc. installing 'pre-finished architectural sheet metal'. For the most part work involved installing standing seam metal roofs. There was a bit of other miscellaneous work such as steel framing.