Oscar

Above: El Mexicana Restaurant, Salina, UT. 20 July 2024.
Out and about on the 'Wing.

Oscar is The Monk's grandson. He's eighteen years old. I've known him since he was a little kid. He was bored in high school, quit, and then got a GED on his own. He's now enrolled at Snow College in Richfield, UT to get a certificate in diesel mechanics. He's got his own diesel truck to work on... right behind him in the image. A 1993 Dodge, 12 valve, in-line six-cylinder, Cummins turbo diesel engine. The truck has 400K miles on it. Oscar says he thinks he can drive it another 200K miles.

I had lunch with Oscar, his dad, Dan, Jr., and The Monk yesterday in Salina, UT on my way back from Ivins, UT to Park City, UT. I told Oscar how impressed I was with the direction he had chosen to take in his life. I told him about what retired head of Boeing, Airplane Systems, Don Fehr, had told us ROMEOs at Wasatch Bagel some ten years ago. When asked where Boeing got its best engineers, he replied, "Montana Tech and North Dakota State University." When our shock wore off, Fehr explained that the engineering students coming from these schools were farm boys who had been tinkering with machinery from the age of six. Not only were they good engineers, Fehr said, they worked well in teams. Fehr said too many Boeing hires from the top engineering schools were prima donnas and couldn't work well with other engineers.

I told Oscar that he was so lucky to have been raised on a cattle ranch and how that positioned him well to have a prosperous engineering related career. He may not go to engineering school. He may stay with diesel mechanics. But he will be one of those people "who know how to do stuff," and that will position him well in life today. I told Dan Jr. and The Monk to make sure Oscar meets Kenworth and Peterbilt who would be great sources for career advice.

Oscar. Training to be one of those guys you want to be around when the mud hits the fan.