Thursday, July 1, 2010

Every job is prostitution

In my years, I have worked many jobs...many companies, many fields. Sometimes I would work one full-time job in the day - with a part-time at night, and a spare on the week-end. I have woken early, stayed up late, slept in the cafeteria, and had uniforms stashed in various cabinets.

In my time, I have worked as/in:

Food service: fast food, casual dining, fine dining, server, greeter, bar assistant, trainer, kitchen manager, prep work

Recreation: parks assistant with clean up and activity planning, lifeguard, camp counselor

Retail: beauty supplies, jewelry, clothing, sales, stocking, merchandising

Salon: reception and product sales

Customer Service: call center, customer satisfaction surveys and focus groups, contract negotiation

Banking and Financial Services: consumer banking, teller, retail loans, real estate lending, deposits, private banking, business banking, mortgage collections, investments, mutual fund sales, portfolio advisement, assistant manager, vault inventory

Music: radio DJ, sound engineer (live and studio), artist promotion, music promotion, event planning

Education: private kindergarten, preschool, high school, private lessons, teaching assistant, teacher

Adult: phone sex operator, gentleman's club cocktail waitress, escort appointments, and actual escort

So....maybe it is my overly expansive experience ("I'm a mercenary for experience." Diane Sawyer) - but it irks me to listen to some early 20s whiner girl, who in all likelihood had her university education paid for by mommy and daddy, and has happy happy holidays, whine because "one time, when I worked in a bar, a guy tried to touch me!" or "I walked in on another waitress giving head to a customer." On my friggin' G-d! Grow up!

This coming from the same girls, who proudly proclaim they know how to flirt to get guys in "regular" bars to buy them drinks, or take them for dinner, or pay their nightclub cover.

I have found that every money making job entails some sale of a part of yourself for the pay. Every job requires some kissing of the ass. The problem is - whose ass? and when has it been kissed enough? I appreciate the job where, to put it bluntly, you know what to touch and you know when you have touched it enough to get your money! Sure...your hand is left sticky - but it's nothing a hot shower won't take care of.

3 comments:

  1. Yeah, at the end of the day you have to decide what you are prepared to do - and at what price. I'd do most things if the price is right but I draw the line at anal (literally and metaphorically).

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  2. But is that with a crayon or a permanent marker?!

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  3. Gentle readers: for the record, I do not despise happy 20-somethings, I don't hate happy functional families. I do not suggest that all offspring find reason to cut themselves off from family. (Sure, I have my own dysfunctional, not close family, and was doomed to years of self-survival...but that's another story...)

    I am only begrudging of the person with no real problems, acting like a drunken guy try to cop a quick feel in a bar is some sort of world catastrophe likened to BPoil spill proportions!

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