Working

I’ve worked in some amazing places over the last thirty years, and my God I’ve met some amazing people. The impact those environments made in my life could never be measured, and I’m filled with a warm sense of being blessed just thinking back on them. Every single one served a purpose in its own right. Looking back, I wouldn’t change a thing.

I started working at twelve baby-sitting for $2 an hour, but as soon as I was officially old enough I got a job at a restaurant where my brother washed dishes, a local place called George’s that was known for their steaks and beer-battered onion rings, which to this day I’ve yet to find any that compare. I was too young to waitress and too introverted to host, so they stuck me somewhere in the middle where I thrived.

They called me a wait server and designated me to a large square table around the corner of the main dining room, just out of sight of the patrons and just within smack-talking distance of the chefs. I loved watching them sweating out the heat of salamander grills and gas flames, multi-tasking like geniuses and hollering at each other, slipping on floors and producing some of the most delicious food Polk County ever tasted. There was a balance of hard work and cutting up going on all around me, and I fit in just fine. At the age of only fifteen I became part of my first work family, and it was a damn good one.

Every evening at the end of the night the waitresses gave me a cut of their tips and after a couple of months I had more money than I knew what to do with so I began saving half of all my earnings. I was too young for a bank account so my stepfather became my personal savings, and week after week I handed stacks of wadded ones and fives over to him. He penciled new totals on the outside of the thickening yellow envelope and kept it in a safe, and before long I saved my first thousand. I bought my first car with a little help from my mother and by never touching half of all of the money I ever made there.

Work changed when I had my son. I waitressed for a while, working every lunch and dinner shift at a locally owned pizza place. The money was good but the owners were a married couple who fought all the time, and after a few months I chose to work at a fast food place where the pay was less but the stress was too. I enjoyed the job well enough, but one day while visiting my sister-in-law she noticed that our little family was just getting by and she told me I should go to school to become a nursing assistant; that it only took a few weeks and I would make good money. Sound advice heard, I was soon licensed and began working full-time as a CNA.

After only a couple months I was approached one day by a co-worker, a nursing assistant who had been there a few decades and who was counting down the hours until retirement. She was the type of respectable employee that had years of perfect attendance and always clocked in on time. For over half of her life she worked from six in the morning until three in the afternoon, and she was tired. She walked up to me that day, put one hand on her hip and the other in my face. She pointed straight at me and said “You will NOT be a CNA for the rest of your life! You better go back to school and you better get your education!” She was five-foot-nothing with foundation too dark for her skin, penciled-in eyebrows and too much extra firm hold hairspray. She wasn’t afraid of anything, and I did as I was told.

I cut down to working weekends only while I went to school for my Bachelor’s degree, and after a long four years, once I graduated the sheer thought of working full-time again appealed to me so much so that my eyes burst with excitement at the sight of every business my car had the capacity to drive to.

The first interview I scheduled was for a full-time position for yet another job as a nursing assistant, this time with the local hospice. I remember the receptionist welcoming me as an expected guest and walking me down the hall to a large meeting room, where six members of leadership stood from their chairs and smiled as I entered. They sat me at the head of that table, each with a sheet of paper with pre-typed questions and blanks on which to write notes about my answers. The CEO was one of the interviewers, and her question, “Why did you become a CNA?” I replied that my sister-in-law said that I could make good money, and that I was still waiting on that. We had a laugh, and I was hired.

A few years later while still working with hospice, there was a pivotal moment when I was told by a supervisor that my words and actions had an influence on the environment and that I alone was capable of steering others’ perception that either all around was crashing or all was being built up. And as decades have passed no wisdom has been more predominant in the determination of my professional development than this.

Once this truth was realized I saw my surroundings in a new light and I felt a responsibility towards my co-workers to be authentic, to always be helpful and to do my best to practice grace in understanding. Embodying this practice set me on a path that ensured I would never be comfortable with a sense of complacency and never view work as something defined as mundane or cumbersome. Instead I viewed my role in my jobs as intentional and meaningful; I understood that I was capable of making a difference.

Now, as I sit here thirty years after my first $2, having been a nurse, a director, even a CEO, I see so clearly what all of these jobs did for me. From the beginning of each to its end, and then to the beginning of the next, I see a beautiful orchestration of people and places, of friendships and partnerships. Of trust in people and in the gradual understanding of their complexities. How I stayed the same and how I grew into better versions of myself through trial and error, and how I was immensely supported by the people around me. These people made such an enormous difference in my life, and as much as an understatement can be stated, I would like each one of them to know that I am forever grateful. Thank you.