First job chronicles

My first job was as a paperboy, back when newspapers actually hired kids to sling a heavy bag (Sundays really sucked ass) over their shoulder, walk a route a collect subscription fees. I wish I could say I most remember things like learning what good honest labor was, but the no. The thing I remember most was learning what embezzlement was. At age 12. For those of you too young to understand how such a lesson could come to pass, let me explain:

The newspaper would deliver your papers to your house. Once a week, a bill for those papers would arrive. Your job was to collect some monthly fees to cover the bill. At the end of month, there would always be some folks left over and that would be your profit. Pretty soon, stupid ol me, started "borrowing" from myself, taking some here and there, figuring I'd just have less profit that month.

Pretty soon, I was in the red, nearly shitting my pants and scheming of ways to make up the money. My parents soon found out and, well, they weren't happy.

I still cringe at the thought of sitting in my silent bedroom, waiting .... father pulls into driveway ... the rusty screen door hitting the doorjam .... some muffled conversation from the kitchen ... the steps creaking ... the first leathery SNAP! echoing up the stairway (my father snapping his the ends of his belt to let us know, here comes the pain) ... SNAP! ... SNAP! ... then pain.

I vowed never to steal again, and haven't.

 

Like Angola and Big Sleeper, my first gig was technically a paper route. (Unlike big Sleeper, I never stole from my employer ) My sister and I split the route for two years...one week for me, one week for her and we both went out on Sundays.

It did send us on irreversible financial paths, though: While she saved every penny, I poured every penny I made into the crack habit known as baseball card collecting. My grades went south around the same time (hi Stormy!). Twenty-odd years later, she has a nice house and perfect credit and I...don't.

Anywho, she quit after two years and I kept the gig until I turned 15, when I got a job at the A&P. That sucked. A lot. Stocking shelves, chasing after carts and bagging groceries, all for a boss who sported a miserable toupee and a worse disposition. Not my fault you wasted your life at A&P, jerkoff.

the last summer with the paper route was the best, though. Crawl out of bed at 6 am every day, put on my Walkman with "Purple Rain" or Dokken's "Back For The Attack," walk the route, go home, flip on KC101 and play Nintendo until noon. Then I'd get on my bike, ride to the pool and swim all day. Ahh yes. That was the life. And that was 20 years ago this summer. Fuck.

 

My first job was a golf caddie at a country club.

Best part? Free round every Monday night, $20-40 for three hours work, snacks (candy, hot dogs) before starting the back nine.

Worst part? Cheap ass members who'd roll up in BMWs and not tip you for taking their bag.

 

I started umpiring baseball when I was 14. Other than shoveling driveways, it was, for all intents and purposes.
I'd say the best thing I learned (other than what sun block didn't come off with sweat) was how to ignore people. You can only hear so many insults before your ears start to bleed.

 

First job here was also umpiring baseball.

Man, those all-day Saturdays were something else: 10 a.m. U-8 teeball, 11 a.m. U-9 "coach pitch", 12 p.m. U-10 pitching machine, 1 p.m. U-12 pitching machine. Half-hour break. 2:30 p.m. U-12 pitch, 4 p.m. U-12 pitch, 5:30 p.m. U-14 rec league, 7 p.m. U-14 rec league.

8 games in 11 hours. Got $12/game for the first four and $20/game for the last four. That came out to $128 for a full day of work. Pretty nice for a 16-year-old, but as everyone knows, officiating is as thankless as police work. And umpiring games of players who were just three years younger left me especially vulnerable to uber-competitive rec-league coaches. But I had some pretty good partners (including one, a year older than me, who's now umpiring in the Carolina League), so we didn't have many problems.

Except for the time I almost learned the hard way that just because the law prohibits a parent/fan from "assaulting" a 16-year-old umpire doesn't mean he won't.

 

During my breaks from college I was an "Attractions Host" at Disneyland, which is Disneyspeak for a ride operator. I worked in Fantasyland, on the Matterhorn, Carousel, Mr. Toad's Wild Ride, and Peter Pan. Great job for a college kid, especially since a huge percentage of the people I worked with were also seasonal hires from colleges all over the country.

Great job to learn how to deal with the public. It's not easy, and the standards are very high.

Great for celebrity sightings, too. Cher came on the Matterhorn - Sonny Bono must have been a dwarf, because I remember Cher towering over him and she was maybe 5' 7". Barbra Streisand was staggeringly homely. Unfortunately Michael Jackson came on the Matterhorn on my day off, so I missed him. He asked if it was a real mountain.

 

I would have shot myself.