My Crappy Jobs
Learning to quit.
Hi Cringers,
Taking time to reflect on our early crappy jobs can help us understand ourselves better and what we do and don’t want from work. Also, it’s just funny.
So, come with me down memory lane. Early Isabel had a lot of terrible work experiences. My misery is your entertainment. You're welcome
2003 - Découpage Pin Assembly Line
My first real job was on a découpage pin assembly line. Yes, you read that right. It was the summer after sophomore year, so I was technically still a child.
My friend got me the job. The role was to assemble artful pins, which involved popping various shapes out of colorful paperboard, assembling them with tweezers and glue, and then covering them in Mod Podge.
We weren’t allowed to talk, but we could listen to music. That summer I was listening to Death Cab for Cutie on repeat and crying inside about what I was doing with my one life to live (nothing changes).
The assemblers were all female and ranged from children (like me) to retirees. We sat in an open-plan room around various tables under the cool buzzy glow of fluorescent lights.
I was over it on day one. Not only was I bored out of my mind, but I was also a terrible gluer. You’d think that all those years of overplucking my adolescent eyebrows would have set me up for success with maneuvering the tweezers, but I just couldn’t seem to get those little shapes into the right places. The result was a sticky mess.
Meanwhile, my friend was on the other side jamming to Yellow Card’s Ocean Avenue and killing it, every shape in its right place, not a speck of glue in sight.
Gluing is not a core competency for me. I either pour too much or too little, or too little and then too much to compensate. Then I would try and rub off the glue spots with my grubby, gluey fingers and get even more glue all over it. This was my hell.
I got pulled into the boss’s office a few days later.
“We can’t sell these,” my boss said, pushing my gluey mess of pins towards me.
They felt bad firing a child, so instead they isolated me in a separate room and demoted me to popper.
“No glue, just pop these shapes out,” the boss said, closing the door.
I blocked out the rest of that summer. I don’t remember if I quit or if I finished the season. I just remember the popping of paper and Death Cab for Cutie in my ear saying, “And it was true that I was truly failing.”
2006 - Activities Coordinator on The CAT
I found my next crappy job on Craigslist. “Activities Coordinator,” it said, “Entertain guests on a high-speed ferry from Maine to Nova Scotia.”
I could do that, I thought. I imagined walking around the ship wearing one of those cute sailor hats and rubbing elbows with the crème de la crème of Canadian society.
I felt this was the job I was born to do. I had found it. I would sail the seas forever, coordinating…activities.
The interview process was suspiciously easy. I think I called and told them I was a “good learner” and they told me to show up the next day.
It would be a long day. Three and a half hours from Portland to Nova Scotia, two hours on dock, then another three and a half hours back.
When I arrived I was greeted by, let’s call him Pete, my boss. Nice guy, in his 40s, and a long-time CAT employee. He toured me around as the passengers arrived.
It was a nice boat; spacious sun deck, sophisticated lounge, then he took me down a level to where I imagined third-class passengers would have been assigned on the Titanic.
“And this is where you will be spending most of your time,” he opened a door into a room filled with kids. “Just keep the movies going,” he said.
I came to understand that the “activities I would be coordinating” would be babysitting and changing DVDs in a windowless, rocking room with fifty screaming children while their parents were up on deck sipping cocktails in the Atlantic breeze.
I immediately regretted my decision.
The boat horn blared. We were leaving the harbor. I felt as if I were being trafficked to Canada. I kept counting down the hours on my fingers. 9, 8, 7, in Nova Scotia, 4, 3, 2, 1, back home! I can do this, I thought. What a job! What a grand adventure! Think of all the stories I’ll have to tell.
The first hour was okay. I mostly watched Cinderella, looked out the porthole, and imagined drowning.
Then around noon, Pete came down to get me. He must have felt bad for me because he decided to give me the treat of making the afternoon announcement on the intercom.
I was nervous as hell. I hate public speaking. I’d prefer people don’t look at me or listen to me ever. My voice was shaking the entire time.
“At-t-t-tention pa-passengers, we’ll b-be ar-arriving in Port-I-mean-Nova Scotia in 2.5 hours.”
“Isn’t that fun?” Pete asked, taking the sweaty receiver from my hand. I nodded with all the fake enthusiasm I could muster.
“Ready for lunch?” he guided me to another windowless room in the bowels of the ship.
A few other employees were already at lunch, mostly older guys in their 50s and 60s. “Have a seat!” They said. I squeezed in, already exhausted by the level of social interaction that day.
They mostly ignored me, except to tell me a few dirty jokes, something about seamen.
I finished my tuna sandwich and left.
I knew I was going to quit. I couldn’t make it through the summer like this. The next two and a half hours went by in a blur, a mix of Cinderella and quitting fantasies. I imagined jumping off the boat, deserting them all in Nova Scotia, or stealing a lifeboat and paddling to Jamaica.
By the time we reached Nova Scotia, I was done.
I got off the boat and ran up the nearest hill.
Death Cab for Cutie lyrics echoed in my head, “The Atlantic was born today, and I'll tell you how. The clouds above opened up and let it out…”
I remember looking down over the bay and crying into the wind. Why couldn’t I handle work? Is this what people did forever? They did these crappy jobs? Was this all there was to life? How depressing.
The boat horn blared. My abuser was calling me back. Two run-throughs of Cinderella and three child meltdowns later, we arrived back in Portland.
“I’m too seasick for this job,” I told Pete, “I quit.” He didn’t seem surprised. I would bet I was one in a long line of “Activities Coordinators” to leave.
When I stepped off the boat, I felt as if I had been at sea for years. My legs were wobbly and my ears were ringing from the sounds of screaming children.
I vowed to never coordinate activities for people again.
There aren’t any lessons to any of this, other than it’s okay to quit if you’re miserable. Sometimes jobs are crap. You have to honor yourself and hold on to your sanity as much as you can, and sometimes that means quitting.
Do you have any horrible work experiences you want to get off your chest? Please reply to this email and share. I love crappy work stories.
Until next time, Cringers! Be well, do good work, and quit if you want to.
-Isabel
Living for the voiceover.