Worked on a welding line at a factory, fairly boring, repetitive work, but I was somewhat good at it and got promoted to a line lead. I fucking hated that position though. My coworkers who I had worked with saw it as an opportunity to slack off because someone they knew was a higher-up, while the actual higher-ups were assholes who had no respect for the workers and talked about them like they were trash, just no respect. I felt like I was caught between opposing groups and I didn’t want to turn into the sort of person that devalued my fellow workers, so I stepped down from my position.

I was was not liked by management after that and got suspended for welding scrapped parts that were… scrap, they were unusable (these are for car seats, you do not want scrap parts in car seats, they always get trashed). To relieve the boredom one night while a machine welder was down, I welded some small scrap parts together, MIG welding is actually kind of fun sometimes. My replacement line lead apparently reported the welded “sculpture” I made (nothing identifiable or offensive) and they said that I was destroying company property and suspended me. I was already in the process of transitioning to college, so I just never went back and it was the best decision I ever made in my life.

Got into graphic design, found a well-paying job right after graduation and I’m making way more than I ever would’ve had I stayed, plus I get to work from home, NEVER would’ve gotten that from a factory job (for obvious reasons I guess).