Maybe you're a cop or a firefighter or, like me, a utility worker.
Maybe you're working a cash register at a gas station.
Or selling concessions or parking cars at a sporting event.
Or driving an ambulance. Or working the emergency room in a hospital where that ambulance will show up.
Maybe you're guarding our borders or patrolling our coasts.
Maybe you're answering the phone at a suicide prevention hotline.
Or you might be the concierge at a fancy hotel. Or a maid at that same hotel. Or a dishwasher.
Whatever it is that you do that causes you to be working on a holiday, you have been deemed "essential". The wheels of our economy simply cannot turn if you don't forego quality time with your family and show up for work.
This will be the fourth Christmas in a row that I've been forced to work. The company asks for volunteers, never gets enough, and then forces people using reverse seniority.
It's the same for every one of our holidays; Memorial Day, Fourth of July, Easter, Thanksgiving, Labor Day (oh the irony of being forced to work on a day dedicated to celebrating the efforts of labor).
Economic forces dictate that there can never be a day where everything shuts down, where everything gets put on hold and people just get to enjoy time with their families.
I mean I get it. Doctors, cops, firefighters. We need you out there. And I guess we need me out there too. Heaven forbid your broadband goes down and you can't watch the bowl game.
So, if you're working Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, New Years Eve, New Years Day; remember there's a shitload of us out here doing the same thing. Someone has to.
I feel you my sisters and brothers.
And to those of you able to enjoy the holidays with family, please take just a moment to think of us. We are out here to facilitate your lifestyles. We are out here making sure everything works the way you expect.
We are out here so you don't have to be.