How much did you know about what your parents did for a living growing up?

[reecejackox]

All I knew is that my dad would leave the house around 6am

 

[WDWEPCOT]

Just about everything for father - knew what he did and what it involved and his second job too
Mother did not work

 

[E&Cmom]

My dad was a high school teacher so that is pretty straight forward what he did. My mom was a stay at home mom until I was 11-12.

 

[nw6675]

Father was a navigator in the USAF. We never knew where/what specifically he was doing on his missions.

Mother was a SAHM.

 

[Luv Bunnies]

I knew everything about what they did. Dad was a police officer. He came home for lunch most days and parked his patrol car in the driveway. We got to sit in it and look at all the cool stuff. Mom was a nurse. She left for work in her white dress and shoes. She would call during her dinner breaks and talk to each of us. We always asked which department she was working in that day since she was a part-time floater. Sometimes she would be in emergency, sometimes pediatrics, etc.

 

[dreamer17555]

My mom worked for the IRS- revenue agent. she spoke often about her job and the Oklahoma City bombing is burned in my brain. My dad was an airplane mechanic.

 

[chickapin parterre]

everything....in the 60s my mother feed her family on resturant tips and then did the same after her divorce....long ways from NYC Rockettes.

everything in the 70s...my father's nerves in his back became numb so he could the handle the pain of putting concrete block under the edges of pioneer homes that were built on rocks...putting a new foundation under the home.....I know every detail...summer time as a teen I handed hims those blocks, I dug those ditches, mixed the batch of concrete....on his knees he did not have to twist his back and he crawled around the houses...the real plus was my collection of opposum skeletons we would find if all the dirt had to be dug out from underneath the house....yes oregon some folks built their homes right on the sand.

 

[tvguy]

Most everything, I think.
My dad was a lumber salesman. He would drive to the lumber mills, sometimes taking my mom and I, buy a couple semi loads of lumber, get in the car, drive home and find a buyer for them before they were delivered.
My mom was a surgical nurse on the overnight shift. Ate a lot of breakfasts as she told me what kind of surgery (usually emergency on the overnight shift) she worked on. Usually pretty graphic. Needless to say, I never had a skate board, roller skates, never went snow skiing or had a motorcycle.
I did learn an important life lesson. Once in the while she came home and said "the operation was textbook perfect, but the patient died". Always from some ailment not related to the surgery, but I learned that you can do something perfectly and still ultimately fail.

 

[indimom]

A good amount. Dad was a home builder/contractor. His office was in the house, where he met with customers, designed every home he built, created estimates for the materials and labor, and mom managed the books. We would go to job sites with him in the summers, clean up construction debris for change, etc. Nights he farmed our small 90 acres, and we often rode along on the tractor or combine, helped pull weeds in the fields, or played in the grain bins.
Mom was a housewife until I was in junior high. Then she became a lunch lady at the local grade school. Pretty straight forward job which I had seen first hand from all my years in school.

 

[Walt's Dream]

A lot.
My mom was a microbiology major, but decided to be a stay at home mom. However, she was a gifted musician; pipe organist, pianist, and singer. She would substitute at our large church in Houston and also play for weddings. She was also a rehearsal accompanist for the Palo Alto Children's Theatre (of which I was a part) and a singer in the Peninsula Bach Choir.

My dad was involved in infrared astronomy and later became a Mission Director on the Kuiper Airborne Observatory, based out of Moffett Field, CA. I remember that he would tell us take-off time, and we'd go to the end of our cul-de-sac, and see and hear this beautiful converted C141 painted in NASA colors climb for its usual 10 hour flight with astronomers onboard. Many important discoveries were made on the KAO including rings of Uranus, atmosphere of Pluto, and Supernova (full page picture of my dad at computer in Natl. Geographic in early 80's). My dad retired from NASA and is credited with naming the successor to the KAO- SOFIA( Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy).

**As a post script...many years ago when on my way to San Jose Airport to return home after my dad's memorial service, we drove past Moffett on the 101. Guess what was parked next to it's old hanger...the Kuiper. Talk about tears and believing in signs from above. Heard a rumor that it may be sent to the "Boneyard" at Davis-Monthan, but do not know.

 

[BlueStarryHat]

My Dad worked at an auto supply parts place when I was a kid. I had a vague idea of what he did because he wore a workman's shirt with his name on it and the name of the place. I have one photo of him outside the store. My Mom was stay-at-home until I was thirteen, then she got a job as the overnight manager at a Dunkin' Donuts. Free doughnuts every morning in the house. By then, my Dad had been left his parents' ceramics business and tried running that for a few years, and my sister and I helped out there and knew the business like the back of our hands. So I knew that very well.

 

[serenitynow]

Nothing. My dad was in the USAF. Didn’t know what he did. Still don’t. It was classified. This didn’t seem odd to my as a child, since lots of military brats lived that life. We had “no need to know”.

 

[luvnwdwgal]

Everything. My dad was a mechanic for a local car dealership and my mom was a housewife.

 

[chickapin parterre]

so any skills of working on a classic car transfer over

Everything. My dad was a mechanic for a local car dealership and my mom was a housewife.

 

[Frozen Canuck]

My dad was a farmer and he was outstanding in his field.

 

[OKW8297]

My dad was a truck driver and my mom was a secretary. I would go to work with my Mom sometimes.

 

[cedricandsophie]

my dad worked in a foundry, second shift. My mom stayed home. Before I was born my dad was a coal
Miner and then served in the army during WW2. He was the only one in his family yo graduate from high school. My mom only went to 8th grade and worked in stores until she married my dad.

 

[RangerPooh]

Dad worked in delivery, mom in retail. Self explanatory.

 

[disneydreamer1980]

Everything. Dad was a high level judge appointed by the governor and mom a neonatal nurse. They both always talked about work and my dad was always entertaining various officials. They both recently retired and they still always talk about their old jobs lol

 

[loves to dive]

Most of my childhood Mama didn't work. She worked in my Grandmother's restaurant as a waitress for about a year and worked as a manager of a restaurant my junior year in high school. Other than that, she was a stay at home mom. Daddy was a civil engineer. Most of my childhood he worked for the State Highways but a few years he worked for a testing lab, testing soil. He also worked in the middle east building roads and buildings. I knew what he did since I went to work with him sometimes.