Hi, this will be one of those long rambling personal stories. I have a new job in retirement, to make some extra cash to supplement that Social Security. It's also one of the most interesting and entertaining things I have ever done.
I just finished my first week working as a caf lunch lady for the St. Paul MN school system. I am 62 years old and have arthritis in my back, so this is hard. I have found that frontloading with ibuprofen helps a lot.
I really hope my back holds out. I really do. I LOVE this job. I have never in my life worked a job where I was surrounded by this many kind and caring people. And the kids. Oh geez, the kids. They are ADORABLE. I have been childless all my life, and not around that many kids, tend to regard them as noisy and annoying, if not even a little scary.
This school is in east St. Paul, close to Maplewood. The ethnic makeup is maybe 20% white kids, 25% black children, the vast majority being Somali and Hmong children.
My Dad, old white racist as he is, asks me if I'm afraid to drive to the "ghetto" every day to go to work. Ghetto? This school is smack in the middle of a residential neighborhood. I said "Dad, all the lawns are mowed, and there are flowers and bird feeders in every yard".
But that's the way you have to talk when dealing with my family.
Everybody is so damn friendly. I'm not used to that in a job. Most jobs I have ever had, I was surrounded by old white Republican men. This job, everybody is - like me, meaning kindred spirits. Everybody says hi right away, introduces themselves, and is nice. Maybe it comes from working around children. My sister says "you're different already - I can tell you've been with kids all day - you're so damn SWEET" hahahah.
The work is hard. Backbreaking even. Every smallest task is magnified by how huge and heavy everything is. Institutional sized cans and containers of food, big heavy tables which need to be moved. I will definitely build up some muscle. I hope. Certainly these other ladies have some. They can throw around all this heavy stuff like it was styrofoam.
One of the ladies has taken me under her wing a bit. She is black, probably around my age (it's hard to tell - she says she has five grandchildren, but she looks young to me - anywhere from 40 to 65 - but I think from what she says to me that she is close to my age). I say this only because I don't know much about these ladies yet, they're not quite comfortable enough with me to trade too many personal stories as yet, although I think that will come. Anyways. Black lady. The other two are Hispanic, much younger, and strong as the Hulk. They are nice and not unsympathetic, but to them using the cart to move heavy things is just unnecessary and slows things down. They don't know what it's like to be old and have arthritis. This black lady does. (Excuse me for mentioning races and ethnicity of everybody in this story, but for this clueless old white woman it's all a huge part of the experience. Kind of like visiting another planet, in some respects.) This lady notices whenever I'm struggling with something, she hurries to help me, and freely shares her tips for saving your back when dealing with heavy things. And she told me "if you hurt your back, you haven't been here long enough, they won't pay you". Meaning workmen's comp, I think. These ladies are savvy, they know the rules and they know their rights. And they share that knowledge freely.
Then there are the KIDS. OMG. They are so adorable. I'll just be going along, working hard, maybe clutching my back because it hurts, and I'll be blindsided by an irresistible bit of squee. This little boy tugged on my apron in the hallway, says "what's your name" I told him Rose, then said "and what's your name sweetie" he says "Noah" I said well very nice to meet you Noah" he says "I'm glad you're here" and then ran off to rejoin his group. There are a million things like this. I could tell you all of them, but we would be here all day.
Working with these kids just makes me madder than ever at Republicans. I'm 62, I won't live to see the worst effects of their work (pollution, global warming, no middle class), but these kids will. Some of them could even still be alive in 2100, looking at a ruined planet and ripped social fabric. Sorry for the hyperbole, but it just makes me so damn mad. They deserve better.