Cleaned out my old toolbox and found my first welding cert card from 2004

I mean, I was just sorting through a bunch of old junk, you know? Pulled out this little plastic card, the laminate all cracked and yellow. It was my very first ASME Section IX cert for 6G pipe. The date on it hit me. I've been a card-carrying boilermaker for twenty years next month. Idk, it just felt heavy in my hand. I remember being so nervous for that test in the Philly union hall, my hands were shaking. Now it's just a thing I do without thinking. Has anyone else dug up an old piece of paper that really made you stop and count the years?

3 comments

3 Comments

averymartin20d ago

Yeah, that "thing I do without thinking" part is so real. I get that with my old driver's license photo. It's like you spend years trying to get good at something, and one day you just wake up and you're the old guy who knows how to do it.

angela68720d ago

It's just a piece of plastic, not a time machine. People get way too deep about old paperwork. The real skill is in your hands, not some card.

carr.elliot20d ago

Found my first contractor license from the same year in a box of tax stuff. That little blue card felt like a brick. I was so broke back then, eating ramen to pay for the test. Now I run three crews. Where did all that time go?