I’m very proud of the P. Eng. behind my name.

That’s not a surprise for anyone who already knows me… but what many may NOT know is that my engineering interests began to surface at quite a young age. I think if I go back to being a small child, maybe 8 years old, I can identify some ‘early warning signals’, as I like to call them.

I grew up with an extraordinary fondness for playing in the rain.

We lived out in the country, and I loved digging in mud. There was something so fulfilling about excavating intricate series of canals and tunnels between puddles. I realized a real zest  for digging things up and moving them around, making them different or better… I loved to get in there and get dirty, literally.

As I got older, part of my chores were to put the dishes away.

My engineering side raised its head yet again, and I decided to invent a machine that would put them away for me. It was a truly elaborate system of conveyor belts that magically stayed up in the air without support… Self suspending conveyor belts. Looking back, I can see that I loved to conceive of new things.  (And no, I never got the dishes putting away device actually working… truth be told, the first prototypes have yet to be created…)

In high school, I fell in love with the idea of the periodic table.

Sounds incredibly nerdy, I know, but think about it! The Periodic Table is really  a master key to the universe… everything that everything is made up of is listed on that table! It’s a complete listing of the most basic elements of everything we see around us! I learned through the Periodic Table that I love the process boiling things down to their constituent parts. I love to understand what they’re made of, and make them better.

My college years.

Digging in the dirt is civil engineering, and anything to do with conveyor belts is mechanical engineering but in college, I chose to specialize in materials and metallurgical engineering. I learned all about ceramics and polymers – a cool mix of old school and new school materials. It was actually my metallurgical background that got me my first job in manufacturing. I learned piles – and became fascinated with powder metal process. It’s VERY cool… a whole other blog post, truth be told.

I believe that engineers do important work.

Engineers enable the quality of life we enjoy these days. Many of the luxuries people take for granted are due to engineers. I feel a great sense of pride and kinship with my fellow engineers, and am thrilled to be in the company of people committed to making things better!

For more about my venture that specializes in telling great stories about engineering, and inspiring others to do the same, check out Engineers Of Tomorrow.