What really is a structural engineer?

Every structural engineer has been asked this question at multiple times in their career, yet we still struggle with our response. Some would say that is because of the old "I'm an engeneer enginere engenere...I'm good at math" adage. There's probably a good amount of truth to that. After all, we are structural engineers, and we are probably better than anyone at poking fun at ourselves. If you know a structural engineer well, you have probably seen him or her cringe when someone mistakenly uses the work "cement" when the right term is clearly "concrete". I mean, who else would be bothered by such a thing? Admittedly, we are an easy target of ridicule, as we easily get fired up about the misnomers - like how "value engineering" is the furthest thing from engineering, and how a movement joint is not the same as an expansion joint. We consider mowing the lawn to be a form of art - we are known for taking pride in our freshly mowed lawn's straight lines (and sometimes may even go crazy and mow patterns into the lawn for fun). We are people who avoid eye contact and sport our khakis that we insist will never go out of style. We love a good structural pun more than we should admit, and those that are not G-rated still do make us giggle like the "enginerds" we were in school. Construction-related oxymorons always make us snicker. "Affordable housing", "lightweight concrete", heck even "civil engineer" is a good one. 

Okay, where was I? Right, defining a structural engineer. I admit, when I was a kid and learned that my uncle was a structural engineer, I totally pictured him riding a train, wearing a funny-looking striped hat - because engineers drive trains, of course. Well, most of us are actually onetime wannabe architects who realized we were just better at number crunching than having artistic vision. In an oversimplified statement, we often describe ourselves as those who design the skeleton that supports an aesthetic or architectural vision. That basically sums it up. 

I have to admit, though, one of my favorite definitions came from Dr. AR Dykes, of the British Institution of Structural Engineers, who once stated that "engineering is the art of modelling materials we do not wholly understand, into shapes we cannot precisely analyze so as to withstand forces we cannot properly assess, in such a way that the public has no reason to suspect the extent of our ignorance." Again, if we can't poke fun at ourselves...