I am in my fourth year of an electrical apprenticeship. Anyone who has worked in a trade knows how difficult it is. Trade work is most definitely not for the faint of heart. Being a sparky has been a test of my stamina and resilience every day since I finished school five years ago. Don’t get me wrong though, I do love my job. I love getting my hands dirty and solving problems. I’d prefer to crawl under a house than work at a desk, so this is the way life is for me.
I’m sure I would’ve found my apprenticeship a lot easier if I had been given my own company car to drive around. I currently drive my own personal car. It’s small. The smallest car of any of the men on site. I don’t mind too much about that, what I do mind though is that I have nowhere to fit my tools. They are currently piled up in my back seat, with my two ladders up top on the roof racks. My car definitely isn’t suited to my job, and it’s made everything more difficult. I can’t even list the amount of things I would do for ute trays. Melbourne tradespeople all have them, and for some reason I have had to put up with not owning one the entire time.
I really thought I’d be given my own company car honestly, that’s why I never invested in a ute of my own. But now that I’m nearing the end of my apprenticeship, it’s become very obvious that I need to bite the bullet and make the purchase. I think I’m going to invest in aluminium ute canopies to deck out my car with. I assume I’ll have to buy a new car as well, seeing as my current one wouldn’t be able to support any sort of structure on top of it.
As soon as I get my pay rise I’ll make the investment, I won’t be able to afford it until then. Here’s to passing my qualification exams.