Work

As I begin typing these words, it is 10:04 a.m. on Sunday, March 14, 2010. Amazing, isn't it, how quickly the present becomes the past? Time is a subject I've touched on frequently in these blogs, but its mention here is only as testimony to just how quickly it passes, and to note the imminent passage of another minor milestone in my life. This is my last day of part-time employment behind the information desk at the Century Shopping Center, after more than three years of a never-missed Saturday or every-other Sunday. It was probably one of the easiest jobs I have ever had, consisting exclusively of validating shoppers' garage parking tickets and directing people to Bally's Gym ("All the way down the hall, in the back. Two elevators. Get off at Level 7."), the movie theaters ("Level 4; elevator or escalator."), and the washrooms ("Every level but this one; far right corner."). But it will not be missed.

And, with luck, the end of my tenure here will mark the last time I will ever work for anyone other than myself--though I do not consider writing to be work.

In reflecting on my entire...and somewhat checkered...work history, I find I probably should be rather embarrassed by the fact that it was so very far from being what anyone would consider distinguished.

A quick rundown of every job I can ever remember having held, from the very first time I was paid (25 cents an hour for planting potatoes) provides the following, roughly in the order they were held:

While still in high school, I had jobs as a soda jerk and a page in a library. During college, I worked summer jobs ranging from being a "gofer" in the factory my dad worked at, to a city street maintenance worker. I guess being in the Navy qualifies as a job, but I suppose I can't really start counting jobs until I left college and entered the "real world." My first post college job was for Chicago's Olson Rug Company, where I worked answering customer letters on a gigantic and primitive ancestor of today's computer. I moved on to an insurance company, where think I was supposed to be an adjuster, though I cannot recall my specific duties until I convinced my supervisors that the company needed a corporate newsletter and I was put in charge of it. I next went on to an international franchise carpet and furniture cleaning organization as assistant editor for its house organ and doubled as an instructor during monthly new dealer training courses and seminars around the country.

I left after six years to move to L.A., where my first job was for Peterson Publishing (Car and Driver and similar magazines) then, when my entire department was fired in an internal civil war, went to a small public relations firm where I (and every other employee) served as flunky and whipping boy to an incredibly tyrannical boss who served as the model for C.C. Carlson in my second book, The Butcher's Son. From there I took a job as editor of a magazine for building maintenance personnel, and from there moved on to a company developing chemicals to identify the ripeness of fruit to shoppers in stores. That led to another p.r. firm to edit two disparate magazines--one for crop dusters and the other for an organization of California road contractors.

When my mother died, I quit my job, bought a motor home, and took off for several months until necessity required me to return home and find employment. I was lucky enough to be hired as a book and magazine editor for the largest porn mill on the west coast and left there only after the company closed six years later. I then fell into the job of editor of an international gay men's magazine. I was fired (on a cordial basis) after three years due to disagreements with the publisher as to where the magazine was headed. I put my house up for sale and planned my move to northern Wisconsin, where I dreamed of opening a bed and breakfast (be very careful what you wish for). While I waited for the move I worked temps for several months, mostly at Rockwell International.

Having a B&B is wonderful, if you don't have to depend on it for your livelihood. I, unfortunately, did, and soon found it necessary to find a job. I managed a co-op health food store...a job I loved...for a couple of years until I was fired at the instigation of a member of every co-op's bane, an always feuding board of directors. I subsequently worked at a credit union, and as a bagger/checker at a supermarket.

When I returned to Chicago after nearly 40 years, I did a few temp jobs stuffing envelopes and then got the job at the shopping center, which I am happily leaving today.

And there you have it; yet another example of my telling you far more about a subject than you care to know.

New entries are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Please come back...and bring a friend. Your comments are always welcome. And you're invited to stop by my website at http://www.doriengrey.com, or drop me a note at doriengrey@att.net.