CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT
It was 2004 and I was working in retail at Macy’s. My income was smaller than it had been in the military, but nevertheless I was grateful that I had a job. Meanwhile I was also applying for state and government jobs that would give me greater financial stability and offer medical and dental benefits.
The idea of working in law enforcement held strong appeal for me. I believed in the justice system and fighting crime, helping people, and had often daydreamed about being a California Highway Patrol officer. While still working at Macy's, I began applying for jobs in law enforcement. I applied to the Fresno PD and pursued the idea of becoming a correctional officer for the state of California.
Unfortunately, I realized quickly that having English as my second language was going to limit some of my opportunities. After making many trips to Barnes & Noble to study, the California Highway Patrol’s written exam in particular seemed harder than any other test I had ever faced in the past. Not to take anything away from other law enforcement agencies, but I think this is why CHP officers are highly respected and have a reputation for professionalism for the most part. It had also been over a year since I had applied for a corrections position, which seemed to me to be a very slow process of hiring due to the volume of applicants.
The Fresno PD also deserved their own level of respect and recognition, of course. One of the physical tests required to join their ranks was a five-hundred-yard race, and many of the candidates were much younger than me. I wasn’t an experienced runner, but I was in fairly good shape from having played sports all my life; although it wasn’t a hundred percent, my knee was feeling much better after the operation in Wichita, and I was still playing soccer regularly during that time. There were about ten of us candidates racing, and I waited until the last one hundred yards, then sprinted with all my energy. I ended up winning the race, which was a nice surprise. It really didn’t matter what position you finished the race in. You just had to achieve the time the police department had specified.
Finally, when the time came to enter the police academy, there was a briefing, which candidates’ spouses were encouraged to attend, so I brought Melissa with me. During the briefing, we were told where we could purchase our handguns and other necessary equipment before training began. Although she was aware that I had been headed down this path, Melissa was shocked that I was actually so close to becoming a police officer. She had not realized how serious this was until that day.
That evening, when we got home from the briefing, she and my mother both cried and pleaded with me not to go ahead with it. Having gone through so much, though, the idea of dropping out bothered me a lot. I was genuinely looking forward to starting a new and useful career, and I was full of optimism about what I could achieve as a police officer, but seeing both my wife and my mom so distraught bothered me a great deal. After much thought, I informed the police department that I was dropping out due to personal reasons.
I have always wondered about that missed opportunity to make an impact on people’s lives, but I also know being a police officer in America is one of the toughest jobs in the world and carries a great level of responsibility and personal risk.
In the spring of 2005, my friend Ken reached out, and we had a long discussion about where we were in our lives and what career opportunities to consider. Ken was originally from Istanbul and we had met while we were both living in Wichita. With two bachelor’s degrees and hundreds of college credits, he was a professional student but couldn’t set his mind to a particular career yet. He told me he had done some research into available nursing programs.
Nursing was a field I had thought about going into a few times, but I had never believed I could do it. I found hospitals depressing and never liked needles. The only thing I liked about getting vaccines as a kid was the fact that we got to go home early from school. By this time, Melissa had been a nurse for over five years, so I knew very well how stressful the job could be and how much training it required. Still, after many discussions with Ken, I decided to give it a try.
Having a bachelor’s degree would allow me to apply for accelerated nursing programs, but California was a popular state, so these programs had hundreds of applicants for only so many available slots. Fresno State University didn’t have an accelerated nursing program at the time, but I believe they do now. Ken said he had done his research and narrowed it down to three programs in three different states. Eventually we decided on a program in Columbia, Missouri, at the University of Missouri, also known as Mizzou. Mizzou was famous for its journalism program, had a great athletic program, and there were ninety-five bars in downtown Columbia. We couldn’t go wrong!
The university offered an accelerated bachelor's program that would take fifteen months, which was much faster compared to the traditional program. It required prerequisites such as anatomy, chemistry, pathophysiology, microbiology, and nutrition prior to being accepted, though. I knew it would be a very challenging program, especially for someone like me, who had not taken any science classes since high school in Turkey and for whom English was a second language. But I felt ready for change, to be personally challenged and to pursue a new career.
Comments