Working for a Living!

A friend of mine had a post on Facebook and it said "List the first seven jobs you ever had". So that made some wheels turn in my head and I started making a list of all the jobs I've ever had and remembering the good and not so good times all those thoughts dredged up in my brain. 

I made a list going forward from my very first job as a babysitter to the job I have now as a Medical Technologist specializing in Microbiology. Then I made the list backwards- from my job now back in time to my first job and realized I forgot a few jobs along the way and corrected my list. All in all, it was an entertaining cerebral exercise that put me in the mood to write about it. I've done everything from scrub the toilets in the men's bathroom to teach medical students the joys of gram staining bacteria, and a lot of things in between. There are so many good ideas for spin off writing here from debating the minimum wage to discussing why schools seem to be failing, and all from thinking about the various employment situations I've had since I was a teenager. Play along with me and spend a bit of time thinking about the different jobs you have had in your life.

Here is my bare bones list: Chronologically from the past until the present day...

Babysitter

Retail Store Clerk (Department Store)

Fast Food cook and cashier

Library Attendant

Retail Store Clerk (Clothing Store)

Cafeteria Employee

Avon Salesperson

Fast Food cashier and chief restroom cleaner (graveyard)

Retail Store Clerk, display designer and depositor of bank funds at night (Clothing Store)

Retail Store Clerk- Aquatics (Pet Store)

Medical Courier

Medical Laboratory Technician and Phlebotomist

Medical Technologist Generalist

Medical Technologist/Teaching Technologist/Laboratory Coordinator

Community College/Applied Technology College Instructor

Medical Technologist Blood Bank

Substitute Teacher K-12

Special Education Teacher's Aide (Junior High)

Science, Honor's Science, and Art Teacher (Junior High)

Medical Technologist/Microbiologist 

 

 https://youtu.be/9N2CANatVYQ

Great guitar solo by Chris Hayes, live performance with Tower of Power Horns.

Basically from this list, my one sentence explanation of my employment experiences is: "I am a 'scientific labbie type who does not mind being with people", this appears to be a contradiction since most people loving types are not scientific types and most science nerds are not all that social. So I guess I am the embodiment of an oxymoron or maybe I am an oxymoron? Oh well, I have always felt dual pulls from the scientific side of me and the artistic side of me. I have expressed each side at different times in my life-such as when I started college wanting to be a laboratory scientist, then changed my major to Interior Design. I finished up the design program and then went back to college a few years later to finish becoming a lab scientist. I finally "found myself", in the lab, but continued to express my creative side through sewing other handicrafts. 

When I taught junior high it was the perfect juxtaposition of science self and my artsy self and I loved being able to express both sides of me each and every day through the teaching I did. The downside was that when I opened my mouth to talk science to the other 'science teachers' I got a lot of blank stares because the majority of them had never been in a laboratory except for college Biology class. My educational philosophy is not reconstructionism, (IMHO public schools are over run with reconstructionists and that is part of why public education isn't as stellar as it may have been in the past- but that is another discussion all together), my philosophy is more essentialist\perenialist, as in reading, writing and rithmaticism, so I didn't exactly feel that I fit in where I was.

If you had to sum up your employment experiences in one sentence what would that sentence be?