All in a day's work

I went to a luncheon this week where Rick Bragg was the guest speaker, and he said something that really made me think.

Bragg, as you may or may not know, is a journalist and author. He used to work for The New York Times, but I think they finally figured out he’s from the South so they got rid of him. He’s written a few books about his upbringing in north Alabama, and I relate pretty well to his stories, though I think his family was a good bit rougher than mine.

His first book, "All Over But the Shoutin’", is a great story about his childhood, focusing a lot on his mama, who sounds a lot like mine. His daddy, apparently, was a rowdy drunk, so he was nothing like mine. I think I got a better deal.

Anyway, Bragg was saying that he’s sometimes embarrassed when he’s around men who do hard work for a living – men like the uncles he grew up around – and they ask him what he does, and he tells them that he’s a writer. It just doesn’t sound very manly to say to somebody who works on an oil rig or a farm or as a mechanic, or any job where you’re going to get grease under your fingernails.

I’ve never really had an actual hard-working job, either. About the only thing I ever got on my hands was newsprint when I’d grab one of the first papers off the press in my journalism days. Not exactly backbreaking work. There was a summer in my youth when I had to pick apples in an orchard, but that only lasted two weeks.

My father worked at two places his adult life – a textile mill, then a General Motors plant. I’ve had about a dozen jobs so far, and counting, and rarely have I ever actually broken a sweat. It makes me feel a little bit guilty.

When I used to work in public relations, I always hated it when people asked me what I did, because it was kind of hard to explain. That makes you feel really important, when you can’t make people understand what you do. Hell, most of the time I didn’t understand what I did. Mostly just BS’d people. Amazing that you can get paid for that.

I have worked at a grocery store, at a candy maker, at a department store, at a state agency, at two newspapers, at two PR firms, at a bank, and three great big Atlanta companies. I have been fired three times. I have worked hard, but never done hard work.

There is no dishonor in writing for a living. It’s not like I could follow in my dad’s footsteps, anyway – the cotton mills are gone, and it looks like the General Motors’ plants may soon follow. I am thankful just to have a job, even if it’s one where my hands stay clean and my shoes don’t get muddy and I don’t come with any aches and pains, other than the occasional crushing headache.

Just don’t ask me what I do. It’s kind of hard to explain.