A phone call from my nephew got me thinking....

I started at an early age, not sure exactly how old I was, but my dad frequently bought and sold vehicles when I was a kid, and I was always interested in "helping" in the garage. I also had two older brothers who were very interested in cars and I would hang out with them every chance I had.
At some point I got a Honda Z50 mini bike, I was probably around 9 or 10 years old and I rode that thing constantly during the warmer months of the year. It would go seemingly forever on 25 cents worth of gas, and I learned to do smoky burnouts by planting my feet in front of the footpegs and opening the throttle up. Eventually all of the abuse took it's toll on the engine and transmission and it no longer ran.
I decided that I would have to take it apart and figure out what was wrong since no one else was going to do it for me. I don't remember how long it took me to get it apart, but once I did, dad was willing to help with getting the necessary parts to fix it. The only thing that I can remember now is that one of the shift forks was broken, and the rings were finished.
I eventually got it back together with some help from my brother and it ran pretty good. Soon after it was sold and I got a 2 stroke dirt bike that was much faster and more suited to my growing size.
Fast forward a few years, bought my first car, a 67 Charger at 15, did some work on it in auto shop class, then sold it a few weeks before I turned 16, and bought a 68 Ford Fairlane 500 2 door with a 289 and C4 automatic transmission. I worked in a gas station after school, like many others here did, and learned how to do tires, oil changes, etc. Took auto shop for 3 years in high school and have always done most of my own repairs and service to my own vehicles.
Now some 45 years and 130+ cars trucks and motorcycles later, I still enjoy spending time in my garage, even if it's just to hang out.