Instead of feeling the rush of excitement that comes from nearing the end of college, Alec Johnson was full of anxiety. He’d majored in Chemical Engineering at UC San Diego and spent his summers interning at biotech companies, trying to avoid chemicals getting on him, for up to eight hours a day. While he found some parts of chemistry interesting, like theory, his experience made him believe his professional future lay elsewhere. But the young, Seattle-area native didn’t know what that would be. So like other guys his age, he let his friends’ choices influence his thinking. Luckily for him, that involved a practical life skill.

My roommates