Last week I got to spend a few days with family in Chicago. As our activities and itinerary took shape, the trip somehow turned into a tour of workplaces.
One sister has a new role at her university, along with a fancy new office. I got to meet some of her coworkers, and take a brief tour of her building. She’s the boss for now, in an interim role. She’s advanced a bit from some of her past jobs—the restaurant prep role where she burned her arm, the underpaid letter-opening job at Newsweek, and the camp counselor swimming instructor. My own early jobs were similar: teaching kids how to canoe, washing lettuce in a restaurant, selling handbags and cosmetics, and filing in an un-air-conditioned Florida office.
On last week’s trip, we also visited my niece at two of her jobs—one in a bar and the other in a quirky interactive museum. And we took my nephew’s doughnut tour—one of the top five food tours in Chicago. I thoroughly enjoyed watching them both do their thing and share their gifts. If you go to Chicago, be sure and visit The Color Factory and take the Underground Donut Tour (and tip the hard-working employees!)
It’s a particular joy to witness the young adults in my family—my own children, nieces, and nephews make their way, however circuitously, towards the work they are called to do. I remember my father used to show up at our early jobs, standing off to the side—just watching—proudly. I thought it was embarrassing then. Now I understand.
a writing prompt
Think about the early jobs you had, either paid or unpaid. What was a shift like for you? What skills did you develop? What did you learn about yourself?
Make a list, then pick one and write more about it.
bonus prompt: a poem about work and family
What Work Is
—by Philip Levine
We stand in the rain in a long line
waiting at Ford Highland Park. For work.
You know what work is—if you’re
old enough to read this you know what
work is, although you may not do it.
Forget you. This is about waiting,
shifting from one foot to another.
Feeling the light rain falling like mist
into your hair, blurring your vision
until you think you see your own brother
ahead of you, maybe ten places.
You rub your glasses with your fingers,
and of course it’s someone else’s brother,
narrower across the shoulders than
yours but with the same sad slouch, the grin
that does not hide the stubbornness,
the sad refusal to give in to
rain, to the hours of wasted waiting,
to the knowledge that somewhere ahead
a man is waiting who will say, “No,
we’re not hiring today,” for any
reason he wants. You love your brother,
now suddenly you can hardly stand
the love flooding you for your brother,
who’s not beside you or behind or
ahead because he’s home trying to
sleep off a miserable night shift
at Cadillac so he can get up
before noon to study his German.
Works eight hours a night so he can sing
Wagner, the opera you hate most,
the worst music ever invented.
How long has it been since you told him
you loved him, held his wide shoulders,
opened your eyes wide and said those words,
and maybe kissed his cheek? You’ve never
done something so simple, so obvious,
not because you’re too young or too dumb,
not because you’re jealous or even mean
or incapable of crying in
the presence of another man, no,
just because you don’t know what work is.
Source: What Work Is: Poems (Alfred A. Knopf, 1991)
