When I was a kid, I had it all. Dad was x-military EE and ME and knew how to do anything. Only time he ever called a repairman was for the TV, because they didn;t teach TV in the navy schools back then - only single-beam CRT - No audio/video demux stages like was in our B&W back in 1960
When that guy opened his toolkit and his bag of tubes and components - I was in heaven and he always left the bad parts for me . Anyway, stuff I did know and understand kept me busy: Tinkertoy, Erector Set (Like Mechano) Lincoln Logs, I built both the Revell Visible V8 & Airplane engines and flew Kites, rockets and methanol-fueled Cox .049 engined TETHERED airplanes. I made chemicals and explosives (and my own rocket engines), repaired all our and the neighbors bikes, lawnmowers, and gas-engined go-karts and mini bikes. One christmas I got an ExceIite Roll-up toolkit and a soldering iron, and from that day on, was hooked! and regularly dumpster-diving and bringing home all kinds of electrical and electronic equipment and appliances in my little brothers red wagon, to dissect and see if I could figure out how 'It all worked' . My neighbor Greg B. and I had a 2-way comm system with flashing light and speaker/mic linked by 'surplus' Military-grade SS telephone wires that were stretched between our houses and across our alley. We practiced code with that. I had a CB radio license and a 5.0W CB radio (that I found and fixed) with a 35' mast and an 'AstroPlane' antenna strapped to the side of the house, and I chatted with truckers all over the USA regularly. I delivered papers and mowed lawns - made ~$11.00/week and spent my money on all the Radio/TV/CB and Electronics magazines of the day - and then spent more on parts to build stuff I thought I might need. I built Strobes, Wha-Wha, Faders, Phasors, Phlangers and Fuzz-boxes for one of the bands in our town and made ~$12.00 on each one I sold. In HS I excelled in all the Sciences and Industrial Arts classes (Woods, Metals, AutoBody, Plastics, Drafting, Welding..) and I grad 15th in a class of ~300. Then I joined the Army and with my high-aptitude scores in all the tests was selected for ASA the ARMY branch of CIA. They disbanded while I was in my last weeks of special weapons and Explosives/Demolition training- and I was still gonna get my 8yrs of paid college for 3yrs service, BUT I had to pick a new 'career' path. Because of my acute interest and skill in CB and HAM radio, I chose AM/FM/UHF/Satellite Comms and High-Speed Morse Intercept Additional Skill Identifier - more pay for a unique, hard to learn skill..... then off to places to do things I can't talk about, for ~15yrs, all over Europe. I left the Army and became a Field and depot engineer, repairing over 1300 unique data, comms, display and printing devices for a government services contractor and in the course of all this, hopped several follow-on contracts, got married, fathered several children and returned to the USA where I am now a few years from retirement. My next goal is to own a house on a lake and power the entire operation (Heat, Cold, Lights, etc... for 'free' - using only water I pull from the lake to do it, and then circulate it back 'un-tainted' for use by fish and other wildlife, solar oxygenation & rejuevenation, over and over.