It didn’t take me long to land my first job – with a hamburger franchise in Joliet. My starting pay was $.90 per hour and, looking back from today, this was by far the worst job I ever had. Not only was the work hot, difficult and fast-paced, but my co-workers seemed like they had been recruited by central casting for a Dead-End Kids remake. I may have been the only person working there who hadn’t been arrested or who wasn’t out of prison on parole.

One day, a kid I worked with asked me for my favorite number. Being a baseball fan and an admirer of Babe Ruth, I said that I liked the number three because that was Babe’s uniform number with the Yankees. My co-worker smiled a sinister smile and for the next few days, he wrote the number three in ketchup on the back of my white uniform shirt. That never failed to get a laugh from everyone, including the woman who was training me.

Other “highlights” of that job were being intentionally locked in the freezer, being directed to take out the garbage during a torrential downpour and having to work the remainder of my shift soaking wet, and needing to say nothing when a smoking co-worker put his cigarette out in a hamburger before wrapping it and passing it on to an unaware customer.

I quit that job after a couple of weeks. After an experience like that, you’d think that I’d be completely disillusioned with the world of work, but that was not the case. My second job turned out the be the best job I’ve ever had.

A good friend helped to get me a job with the Joliet Park District as a concession stand worker at a public swimming pool. This was a complete turn-around from my previous experience. Not only was I now earning $1.25 per hour, but, as a member of the staff, I got to swim in the pool when it was temporarily closed during the dinner break. We were also able to eat all the candy, hot dogs and popcorn we wanted. We could wear shorts and T-shirts on the job – and girls in bathing suits came to us to place their orders for food and beverages. What kind of a job could be better than that? I would have gladly worked for no pay at all.

But swimming pool work wasn’t going to lead me down a very rewarding career path. At the University of Illinois, I was able to earn money in a variety of fun and interesting ways. Working food service in the kitchen of my dorm allowed me to make friends. Ushering at the Assembly Hall allowed me to see shows and sporting events for free. Washing test tubes for the physiology department allowed me to learn the intricacies of test tube washing. And I even earned $.50 a column inch for reviewing movies and writing articles for The Daily Illini.

Other character-building jobs on my vocational path included working summers in an oil refinery where it took me a week or two each season to get used to the smell of oil, toiling as a stock boy in a going-out-of-business retail store, serving as an aide in a 40-bed locked hospital psychiatric unit, and commuting for a year to downtown Chicago where I tried to be an insurance underwriter.

I moved to the Quad Cities in 1975 where jobs and work eventually evolved into a career. I was fortunate to have spent 40 years in healthcare as a Human Resource Director. In that capacity, I was able to work with hundreds of professional people who were all doing important work in order to help others. Being a part of a workforce like that with the friends I made there was always a constant source of pride.

In my retirement, I’ve kept busy by volunteering as a board member for Friendship Manor Nursing Home, as a committee chair for the John Deere Classic, and as an usher for the Adler Theater. Work, whether paid or unpaid, helps to define us and it’s always best to find an employment situation that’s a comfortable fit. If only my future self could have found a way to send me this column when I was a 16-year-old wearing a red number three on my back.