What jobs have you had?

My Career as a Wage-slave

I started wage-slaving at the age of 10. My dad took me with him as his ‘go-for’ in his plumbing and heating business. He later branched out into remodeling and roofing too, which I also learned and worked at off and on in hard times throughout my working career. He was paying me $10 a week by the time I started high school, that is summers and weekends during the school year.

He was a perfectionist. Needless to say, he was never happy with anything that I did, so once I turned 18, I got a job at a fast-food franchise, Sandy’s, a McDonald’s knockoff, as grill and fry man. Yes, I started out as a server on the takeout windows. That paid minimum wage, which was $1.10/hr at the time, 1965. I worked there for two years, then moved on to better paying endeavors, between stints at community college and trying to discover who I was.

Prior to Sandy’s, early in my high school years, when dad didn’t have anything for me to do, or just didn’t want me around, he got me a job working after school and weekends as a busboy/dishwasher at a local restaurant, owned by one of his friends. That one paid 75 cents/hr. Needless to say, I quit that one even before I turned 18. No, dad was not happy with me…

Once I wasn’t working for dad anymore, mom started charging me $10/week for room and board, so by June of ‘67, I’d moved out and was living in a single closet sized room at the YMCA in Elyria for that same $10/week, and working across the square in a camera shop as a stock boy (minimum wage – $1.25/hr)… but I had my ‘freedom’… That coincided with the incident that I’ve already described, where dad gave me the ultimatum to shave my beard or move out (I did not shave it).

As I’ve already written about my years-long journey to ‘find myself’, I’ll stick to my maturing as a wage-slave, for what it’s worth. And yes, during all these times I was also trying to jumpstart my hoped-for career as a musician, which sputtered for many years, finally igniting in the late ‘70s, and ending shortly thereafter.

For the next decade (‘67-’77), I worked in several different factory settings, including: the Ford plant in Lorain, Federal Mogul in Ann Arbor MI, and US Steel, back in Lorain (where I served my machinist apprenticeship). By that time, I was married to Lynn, and we soon had a couple of children, which I’ve also detailed elsewhere.

Then in the ‘80s, I became fairly compliant, working the mandatory overtime that I hated, but with little complaint. But I was never fully compliant, I’d frequently be punished for skipping work or cutting out early to engage in other activities, such as the time I punched out at lunchtime and went to a two-hour lecture by Buckmister Fuller at Publix bookstore in downtown Cleveland.

I was working at Eaton’s Airflex Div. on the west side of Cleveland at the time, and they were not pleased with me, gave me another day off as punishment. Yes, losing the money hurt, but having the day off was always a plus for me, which I spent at the lakeshore watching the waves pound the rocks and beach, and lunch with my second wife in the small park next to her workplace.

At least once a month, I’d cut out at lunch to go have mine with her (I tried not to get into too much trouble, so only about once a month)… and was always threatened with ‘marks’ on my ‘permanent record’, along with being given another punishment day off. It’s no wonder they got rid of me when an opportunity presented itself, which I’ve already written about in another section.

At Airflex, I’d been making around $12.50/hr as a layout inspector/machinist/machine programmer. All my attempts at finding another similar factory job were in vain. None offered me more than a $10-11/hr income. With my growing family and the inflation of the time, that was disheartening. So, I rethought my strategy going forward.

After Airflex, considering my job hunting experiences,  I took what retirement money I’d saved up and went back to school to finish a BA. It was obvious to me that ‘good’ factory and machining jobs were being phased out, being turned over to robots. As we later learned, they were also being moved to China, India, and Mexico. Of course, that was never mentioned at the time.

It took me about a year and a half to finish school and graduate with a BA and certificate to teach secondary English in the State of OH. Unfortunately, my wage-slavery got even more sketchy after that. And yes, I’ve already discussed this situation elsewhere. I ended up teaching as a substitute teacher off and on through the ‘90s. … I never made enough teaching to justify the expense of my education. Take what you will away from that.

Technical Writing
Prior to returning to school and finishing my BA, I’d been working at Eaton’s Airflex Div, programming a Ferranti CMM, a computerized coordinate measuring machine. I was also responsible to train operators on it and write instructions for its operation and maintenance.

After finishing school, I applied for many secondary English teaching positions. But the market for high school English teachers was waning severely. No one would hire me. The best I could get was as a substitute in the various districts close to home.

So I started looking around for a better employment outcome. It came in the form of a technical writing job for a manufacturer of newspaper sorting machines, only about a half hour from my home. So began the main career vector of my life from college completion to retirement. I graduated from Hiram College in June of 1989 at the age of 42 and retired 20 years later on December 31, 2009.

Of course it wasn’t all Technical Writing. It never materialized into a steady, years-long employment. Industry was leaving the area and all of the US at a staggering pace. I supplemented, between writing assignments, with substitute teaching, taxi driving, waiting tables at the Blossom Music Center before the show restaurant, and evenings three to four times a week throughout that whole time, I also taught martial arts (Judo, Aikido, and Tai Chi). From 1999 until retirement, I worked out of Temp Agencies. No one offered me a full-time job until I decided it was time to retire. Then, of course, the company I’d been writing manuals for (Philips Medical) offered me a full-time job, with benefits. I’d already made up my mind and so turned them down. One of the best decisions I ever made.

–LE

PS: I’ve posted this before, but the prompt seemed to ‘prompt’ a repost…; -)