Your very first job, work

[Smigo]

Hi all. What was your very first job, or work you did? Very first, paper delivery boy on my bike, next one weekend work at 15yrs old a dishwasher at a cafe at the Tullamarine Airport.
I left school half way through the second last year of school here. They in my mind were teaching me nothing I liked so I said to my Mum, can I leave and find a job? She said "if thats how you feel do it"
I did and in a week, at just turned 17, got a job with a landscape gardener plant nursery crew. Then an airport worker.
I was at our school the first to leave early. Never looked back. Iv never been anything great in others minds but have lived a great life in mine. No regrets.
What was yours?
We all come from different walks. I respect a person who picks up rubbish as much as a Doctor. I once did do a rubbish run to be honest in my late 20s at a Victorian coastal town. Later was put on as a general worker then night security ranger that was cool.
What was your first job?

 

[MyMagicMist]

Well, growing up in the country my first working come in the form of at five years old. I got put to tending garden and about six months later, started getting taught to use a push mower.

Then, at about six to seven years old I started working the very small dairy farm for my stepdad's dad. I would fetch cattle in, help mending fences and by the last part of seven years old I was running a tractor to run a line of fence.

I worked the yards, garden, farm, firewood from then on all through school. At age fifteen Pawpaw John, my stepdad's dad came to me. "Son, I'm sorry to ask you this but you need to step up and do what my son is not. You need to work away from home and help your mom." He signed the state's "permission slip" to let me work at fifteen, we need a "worker's permit" it seems if we're starting out young.

I went to work for oh about six months at a Hardee's restaurant. And with my worker's permit Pawpaw also signed off to let me use the roast beef / meat cutting machine. They usually wanted people over eighteen to use it. After that six months I wanted more money and so went to the poultry plant for the first time.

Worked there for a while and even pulled double shifts a bit. Then, OSHA started catching wind of that and fussed at my bosses. So, I got denied to do it any more. It was around this time I learned to shackle live chickens at 58 birds per minute. That was both legs shackled too. So yes, I learned to "MOVE!" It was only two of us back there working.

Then, I drifted and went to a nursing home. I did the dish washing. This is when a cute male nurse, gay as hell, came to me one night. He brought me down to my great grandmother's room. She was making ready to shuffle off the mortal coil. I held her in my arms as Nicky went on and kept everyone else "in the dark". So, yes I've held a loved one as they die.

After that I went on to get my CNA certs. I worked in another "home" for adults. There I was a janitor/custodian and in a pinch could help with nursing. After this I went to a retail store where they needed "extra" hands for a quick "one off" job of laying out the displays/racks.

From that I got hired into the store's abutted restaurant. I was cook, bus person, janitor/custodian, dishwasher, inventory controller. The older lady managing the place would have loved if I taken over as manager, she knew I ran it good.

After that I went and served in the Navy. Unfortunately a medical condition I had all my life and really had no great issue over cost me that spot. I had planned to do 20-40 years there.

Sometime before this I had worked a Burger King for a bit. Did the dishes and some cooking, inventory, cleaning. So then after getting discharged, went back to Burger King, worked at two stores doing the same stuff.

Then at about age thirty I went back to the poultry plant. Things were fully different. There was eight to ten guys in the live hang area now. I only needed to do 12 birds per minute. Could not switch gears to do it and scared eight to ten guys by doing 58 per minute. The guy I worked with earlier in life just chuckled.

Had some incident there and was terminated for just saying something dumb while angry. Can own up I ought not have said what I did but it was not anything directly threatening, yet it still was a snafu for their policy. After that I wound up rebuilding apple transport bins with an apple processing place. Found out I could face strokes if I didn't manage blood pressure, stress, frustration.

Still struggle with those. Take the highest dose blood pressure medicine but at times it still gets deadly high. It is an issue of not suffering stupidity too well. That and working as a six man crew all by myself. Just how I'm geared. I've tried doing less, tried going slower and they just don't fit. Caring less regarding the "work" isn't a good fit either.

Now, I'm a string along "as needed" substitute custodian for our county public schools. Not happy in it by a long shot but my wife says to hush, it's a cushy job with a lot of room to find time setting doing nothing. I condense 4 hrs work into 1.5 hrs and 8 into 4. Again, just how I go. I do good work, the work gets done. I offer to help others but no one ever "needs/wants" help. We all go "our own pace".

Wednesday night I was an hour ahead at one school and had to go to another. It was a "split" shift. Got to the other school and the "Rat Pack" at it was also an hour ahead of their usual time. They said it was because they felt me, "the boss", was an hour ahead so they needed to keep up. We had no contact, the schools are physically about 20-30 miles apart.

Everyone knew they had done the work, had done good too. No one shirked. We just got it done effectively, efficiently. So we all sat doing nothing for about another hour until we could "officially" leave and go home.

It's "work" you move dirt Monday, Tuesday you move the same dirt. *shrugs* No one cares much what you do as long as you show up, do the work. There's no advancing, nothing really "challenging". No room to "grow", no way to really feel "fulfilled". It's just "work".

I think knowing I'll never sire my own natural children to attend these schools, limits my perspective. By that I mean I don't feel any joy in keeping the schools clean and safe for children. I do but it's not at the same level of what someone who could have kids would feel it. I feel proud of my work but it's not a great sense of pride. "Yay, I can move dirt." ... "Yeah? So what? I fix cars, or build nuclear power plants."

Again, to me it's just "work" and I don't mind it but it's not anything I'm finding any joy, benefit, fulfilling purpose in. All I get is the paycheck and eventually a retirement, maybe. Yes, that's lovely and am grateful for it. But really, "that's all"? And then I'm left with all the depression, anxiety. I feel useless, wasted. Anyway, yeah, just work.

 

[Lady Sarah]

My first full time summer job was pulling tassels from corn plants in fields back in Wisconsin when I was 14. The following year, I had a paper route. That lasted a couple years before we moved. After that, it was summer jobs mowing lawns at municipal parks. I found that getting work as an adult meant leaving the state where I grew up. Then, I had so many day jobs and temporary jobs, it's hard to remember them all. I would say the worst job ever was as a telemarketer. My supervisor even stole much of my commission until I got her fired when I could prove it.

 

[Vape Fan]

Newspaper route.

 

[f1r3b1rd]

I guess the first thing I did was cutting grass and detailing cars at 13. When I was old enough for a real job, at 15, I started working in for a valve company running a forklift and learning how to repair valves and oilfield equipment.

 

[Pastorfuzz]

Worked at a gas station pumping gas and doing oil changes at 15.
I remember we had to open up the pumps and change the price per gallon manually on each one. If I remember right , the highest price for regular was 52cents and real 98 octane Premium was 75cents a gallon.
Had to open quarts of oil with a can opener.
No plastic bottles back then. Glass bottles of Coke in our cooler were 10 cents.
The good old days!

 

[Smigo]

Well, growing up in the country my first working come in the form of at five years old. I got put to tending garden and about six months later, started getting taught to use a push mower.

Then, at about six to seven years old I started working the very small dairy farm for my stepdad's dad. I would fetch cattle in, help mending fences and by the last part of seven years old I was running a tractor to run a line of fence.

I worked the yards, garden, farm, firewood from then on all through school. At age fifteen Pawpaw John, my stepdad's dad came to me. "Son, I'm sorry to ask you this but you need to step up and do what my son is not. You need to work away from home and help your mom." He signed the state's "permission slip" to let me work at fifteen, we need a "worker's permit" it seems if we're starting out young.

I went to work for oh about six months at a Hardee's restaurant. And with my worker's permit Pawpaw also signed off to let me use the roast beef / meat cutting machine. They usually wanted people over eighteen to use it. After that six months I wanted more money and so went to the poultry plant for the first time.

Worked there for a while and even pulled double shifts a bit. Then, OSHA started catching wind of that and fussed at my bosses. So, I got denied to do it any more. It was around this time I learned to shackle live chickens at 58 birds per minute. That was both legs shackled too. So yes, I learned to "MOVE!" It was only two of us back there working.

Then, I drifted and went to a nursing home. I did the dish washing. This is when a cute male nurse, gay as hell, came to me one night. He brought me down to my great grandmother's room. She was making ready to shuffle off the mortal coil. I held her in my arms as Nicky went on and kept everyone else "in the dark". So, yes I've held a loved one as they die.

After that I went on to get my CNA certs. I worked in another "home" for adults. There I was a janitor/custodian and in a pinch could help with nursing. After this I went to a retail store where they needed "extra" hands for a quick "one off" job of laying out the displays/racks.

From that I got hired into the store's abutted restaurant. I was cook, bus person, janitor/custodian, dishwasher, inventory controller. The older lady managing the place would have loved if I taken over as manager, she knew I ran it good.

After that I went and served in the Navy. Unfortunately a medical condition I had all my life and really had no great issue over cost me that spot. I had planned to do 20-40 years there.

Sometime before this I had worked a Burger King for a bit. Did the dishes and some cooking, inventory, cleaning. So then after getting discharged, went back to Burger King, worked at two stores doing the same stuff.

Then at about age thirty I went back to the poultry plant. Things were fully different. There was eight to ten guys in the live hang area now. I only needed to do 12 birds per minute. Could not switch gears to do it and scared eight to ten guys by doing 58 per minute. The guy I worked with earlier in life just chuckled.

Had some incident there and was terminated for just saying something dumb while angry. Can own up I ought not have said what I did but it was not anything directly threatening, yet it still was a snafu for their policy. After that I wound up rebuilding apple transport bins with an apple processing place. Found out I could face strokes if I didn't manage blood pressure, stress, frustration.

Still struggle with those. Take the highest dose blood pressure medicine but at times it still gets deadly high. It is an issue of not suffering stupidity too well. That and working as a six man crew all by myself. Just how I'm geared. I've tried doing less, tried going slower and they just don't fit. Caring less regarding the "work" isn't a good fit either.

Now, I'm a string along "as needed" substitute custodian for our county public schools. Not happy in it by a long shot but my wife says to hush, it's a cushy job with a lot of room to find time setting doing nothing. I condense 4 hrs work into 1.5 hrs and 8 into 4. Again, just how I go. I do good work, the work gets done. I offer to help others but no one ever "needs/wants" help. We all go "our own pace".

Wednesday night I was an hour ahead at one school and had to go to another. It was a "split" shift. Got to the other school and the "Rat Pack" at it was also an hour ahead of their usual time. They said it was because they felt me, "the boss", was an hour ahead so they needed to keep up. We had no contact, the schools are physically about 20-30 miles apart.

Everyone knew they had done the work, had done good too. No one shirked. We just got it done effectively, efficiently. So we all sat doing nothing for about another hour until we could "officially" leave and go home.

It's "work" you move dirt Monday, Tuesday you move the same dirt. *shrugs* No one cares much what you do as long as you show up, do the work. There's no advancing, nothing really "challenging". No room to "grow", no way to really feel "fulfilled". It's just "work".

I think knowing I'll never sire my own natural children to attend these schools, limits my perspective. By that I mean I don't feel any joy in keeping the schools clean and safe for children. I do but it's not at the same level of what someone who could have kids would feel it. I feel proud of my work but it's not a great sense of pride. "Yay, I can move dirt." ... "Yeah? So what? I fix cars, or build nuclear power plants."

Again, to me it's just "work" and I don't mind it but it's not anything I'm finding any joy, benefit, fulfilling purpose in. All I get is the paycheck and eventually a retirement, maybe. Yes, that's lovely and am grateful for it. But really, "that's all"? And then I'm left with all the depression, anxiety. I feel useless, wasted. Anyway, yeah, just work.

You got to say goodbye to a loved one. That was golden. I missed both my mother and father's by minutes. I wish id been there but they knew I loved them and always told them I did.
No bro, you ain't useless at all. Even if you feel that way, you ain't to me. Chin up.

 

[Smigo]

Wow, I looked for this thread earlier today and couldn't find it. I was thinking I must have gone to start it last night but didn't hit send!
Just right now saw it.
Was having some issues yesterday with not being able to post here n there and even many peoples Avatars were blank.
Its nice though to hear where we started in life and the stories behind us.

 

[MyMagicMist]

You got to say goodbye to a loved one. That was golden.

Yes. At the time I hated it in a way. She give me a message for my grandma. I conveyed that and it had implications for the family. There was an incident where one family member was burned alive in a shack.

Grandma had thought it had been done by X but great grandma knew that it was Z what did it, and why. The why it was done was quite justifiable. Someone had been threatening toward children in a nasty way.

The sheriff "looked into it", of course, but left it ruled a tragic death by "accidental" fire.Y did often go to sleep with lit cigarettes, plenty of paper in his shack, small area, bottles of booze around too. "Such a sad accident but sometimes that just happens."

Never mind the smell of kerosene at the shack and leading to Z's old barn. Z probably brought the can around to fill an old lamp or something. He was charitable like that, always helping others out.

Yes, realize I left that hanging double entendre. That was for cause, effect, purpose. Apologies but there's a whole sub-culture of what folks call stoner logic. *ahem* Folks can express a lot in a single word because that word can mean so much in regard to context. Things can be left unsaid yet spoken clearly.

If you (general case you meant within this) have trouble reading that from me, that's on you. There's remedy but I'm not saying you need to remedy it. I'm just saying don't think lesser of my writing, communication, me if you're not "picking up everything I'm putting down". I do write quite well and read the same.

Simply because I've been a worker/doer all my life and use my hands, does not exclude intellect from befalling me. It's there I just don't see much use to go get all up on stilts though when I can just use the simple.

 

[Smigo]

Yes. At the time I hated it in a way. She give me a message for my grandma. I conveyed that and it had implications for the family. There was an incident where one family member was burned alive in a shack.

Grandma had thought it had been done by X but great grandma knew that it was Z what did it, and why. The why it was done was quite justifiable. Someone had been threatening toward children in a nasty way.

The sheriff "looked into it", of course, but left it ruled a tragic death by "accidental" fire.Y did often go to sleep with lit cigarettes, plenty of paper in his shack, small area, bottles of booze around too. "Such a sad accident but sometimes that just happens."

Never mind the smell of kerosene at the shack and leading to Z's old barn. Z probably brought the can around to fill an old lamp or something. He was charitable like that, always helping others out.

Yes, realize I left that hanging double entendre. That was for cause, effect, purpose. Apologies but there's a whole sub-culture of what folks call stoner logic. *ahem* Folks can express a lot in a single word because that word can mean so much in regard to context. Things can be left unsaid yet spoken clearly.

If you (general case you meant within this) have trouble reading that from me, that's on you. There's remedy but I'm not saying you need to remedy it. I'm just saying don't think lesser of my writing, communication, me if you're not "picking up everything I'm putting down". I do write quite well and read the same.

Simply because I've been a worker/doer all my life and use my hands, does not exclude intellect from befalling me. It's there I just don't see much use to go get all up on stilts though when I can just use the simple.

Nah. I get you now.
We are a different culture here and was why I last time questioned you. I prefer to put things in the open and ask rather than guess and let things fester. I am in person an in the face no bs type.
I get you now.

 

[gopher_byrd]

My first job was a newspaper route for our town's weekly paper. My first real job was office equipment delivery and repair. Then dish washing and busing tables at Denny's. Then I joined the Air Force and learned electronics and that got me to where I am now as a Smart Grid Field Engineer. I don't have a degree and never needed one.

Good thread @Smigo!

 

[joeyboy]

Worked at a marina/gas station in Swansboro NC for 5 years.

 

[2WhiteWolves]

This really wasn't work. My brothers taught me how to drive so they could throw newspapers and get done sooner. Lol, mom didn't know I was driving her vehicle. I was 12, and if mom had found out
This was more of learning curve for life, that our mom wanted us (my brothers) to go through. Worked at a salvage yard with my brothers. Cleaned vehicles that the owner was going to sale and do other things around there. This one didn't get paid.
First paid job was...lol...drying/cleaning vehicles at Eagle Auto Wash and Detailing Saloon. May not seem to be a too hard of job, but it actually was. A lot vehicles went through and all the owners wanted to get out of there quickly. Did such a great job, that people were actually asking for me to do their vehicles and some gave very generous tips


! WAKE UP ! from the MEDIA SPELL !

 

[Bigrick]

My first real job was at 14. I was a freshmen in High School. Being under 16 required me to get a work permit from schools guidence councilor. They also had resources in obtaining work and set me up in an busy pizza and sub shop washing dishes. The pay was $3.35 hour. I washed my dishes and one day the sandwich dude does not show up. Well the manager asked me if I could make sandwiches as I have at this point eaten at least a dozen of every sub on the menu. So that was my induction in to the wonderful world of food service. That was 40 years ago.

 

[inganeer]

My first paying job was hauling hay. .50 cents a bale. I was 15 and just got my license or learners permit. Hauled all night and usually went straight to school after. Then home for a quick nap and back out into the fields that night. I averaged about $125 a night hauling hay. Payed cash for my first house at 19 lol. It was a 2 bedroom run down little house with two lots for $6000

Sent from my SM-A716U using Tapatalk

 

[BobsHere]

Bagged groceries for a dollar an hour at age 9. When I turned 12 I got a raise to minimum wage. 2.15 per hr.

 

[Bliss Doubt]

At 15 I worked on a farm and knitted sauna supplies. Not the worst job actually and the money was normal at that time.

Welcome to VU, AlfredPaget.