Have you ever stopped to think about how many jobs you’ve had? Have you hopped from one to another over the years, or did you pick a career and stick with it?
I’m the former – a hopper.
I started off as a dishwasher when I was around 13. Mom got a special permit from the school (I don’t know why it was that way, I just know what happened. It’s kind of burned into my memory). Mom needed her cigarettes and, being unable to work due to being diagnosed with Scleroderma, the next best thing was to send her oldest off to wash dishes in a downtown restaurant.
It was not a pleasant experience. I did eventually move up to being allowed to bus tables, but the tips were not for me.
I don’t remember why I quit. Maybe another job came along, maybe Mom felt bad (she should have).
Following that, I’m not sure where I went but one day a few years back I counted 21 jobs throughout my life. That’s a lot of hoppin’.
I’ve worked in retail (Bondi’s, K-Mart, and a few others), customer service (gas company in Arizona). I even worked for Marjabelle Stewart for a while.
The gas company job was really interesting. For a time I worked in engineering as a map maker. That’s right, this person who can’t find her way out of a paper bag was creating and printing huge maps of gas-line locations. After that I moved into customer service and I had a blast. No pun intended – it is a gas company, after all.
I worked the phones. My first memorable call was from an angry man demanding to know why we turned off his gas. I told him it was because he hadn’t paid his bill in three months. He screamed for my supervisor. She stood beside me as she took the call. Her face got red, her eyes got tiny, and she promised the man he would get his gas turned on as fast as we could get there. After he hung up on her she informed me that he was a city councilman on his way to some “bash”, and he was livid that he had no gas service.
Fun times.
I think I lasted about a year as a reporter for Kewanee, but I worked out of a Toulon newspaper office. I’m pretty sure I was seen as an outsider, and rightfully so. Let’s just say I felt overjoyed when I got the same job at the Star Courier.
I’ve worked as a bookstore manager, as a waitress, a newsletter editor, a librarian, an accountant, and a secretary. I have no clue how I got some of those jobs but I’m glad I did. Well, most of them anyway.
I loved being a bookstore manager. I could rearrange things, get to know the customers and their preferences, and since the bookstore was right next to a restaurant, there was food and drink to go along with good books. I ended up also becoming a waitress there. I got a first-hand look at how one shouldn’t behave towards wait staff. I’ll leave it at that.
Having that many jobs brought me into contact with hundreds of people who became friends, ones I remember fondly. Well, most of them. And the customers? Hmmm…. Okay, most of them were terrific, too.
I’m retired now, of course. Actually, I retired twice – once in 2018, shortly after Gary died. I found that reporting from inside a courtroom demands a certain decorum, and having tears running down one’s face is not proper behavior. Then, I went back for a short while and retired again in 2019. What came in 2020 would have put me out of a job anyway, so the timing was pretty much okay.
Somewhere upstairs I have a book I began about all the jobs I’ve had, and one day I’ll find it and be surprised by the ones I’ve forgotten about. That’s to be expected, but I have to say I’m looking forward to finding out what I forgot. Should be a…blast.
