An English assignment Cooper's junior year was to write a Personal Narrative - telling a story with a message, using dialogue, sensory details, etc. At least with a PERSONAL narrative, you are telling your own story, so it should be easier to write ... right? I thought his completed assignment was very blogworthy, as it tells about the time, his first job, etc. Link to the GoogleDoc (here) and included below.
I hear the jingle of my phone, alerting me that I have gotten a text message.
“I won’t be able to come in today, can someone cover my route?” This was sent in our work group chat, where we sweepers are able to notify the supervisor if we are unable to come in to work, and allows subs to cover a route if necessary.
“Yeah, I’ll be able to split your route with someone,” I reply. Even though I am no longer a sub and have my own designated route I do everyday, it hasn’t been that uncommon for me to do someone else's route in addition to mine if needed. So now I get ready for my work day: I take a shower, get dressed and prepared, get a ride to the school, and then I punch my code in to get my shift started. I get to the custodian closet and pull out my cart and start up another day of disinfecting touch-surfaces and throwing garbage out. I don’t really have much on my mind while I’m working, aside from the music blasting through my earbuds, so I think back to when I first got my job back in 2020; a time where many people were getting laid off, not hired.
When I say that people were getting laid off, this was the time when Covid-19 had finally made its dreadful impact. In the months prior, I was aware of this “Coronavirus” spread, but I didn’t think too much of it. I remember seeing things like the U.S. potentially opting out of the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo if it spread more, as well as graphs predicting how many cases there could be in the next few months. All of what I was seeing made it seem like Covid was going to be so drastic, but I thought to myself “There’s no way it’s going to be that bad, is it?” Well…
I could pinpoint the last semi-ordinary day before everything changed, and that’s because it was connected to an interest of mine. On March 11, 2020, tip-off for the Utah Jazz and Oklahoma City Thunder game had been delayed for unknown reasons. This happened a few days after Rudy Gobert mockingly touched the mics at a press conference, and he was listed as sick on the injury report. Then, an announcer in the arena stated that the game had been cancelled, as Rudy Gobert had tested positive for Covid. Shortly after, NBA commissioner Adam Silver made the decision to suspend the NBA season for at least a month.
While the NBA may be unrelated to the functioning parts of a society in most ways, the impact that was made after the season was suspended was drastic. In the next couple days, there were shortages of supplies in the stores, schools moved online, and non-essential businesses were shut down. But in a time where millions of people were unemployed for the first time, this was the time period in which I got my first job.
I was hanging out with my friends one day, and we felt our stomachs rumbling. So we hopped into Parker’s car and drove to the nearest McDonalds to order 24 cookies, just ordinary friend things. While we were in the drive thru, Parker and McKay were talking about their job. This was new information to me, so I was curious where they were working.
“You guys have a job? Where are you working?” I inquired.
“McKay and I work as sweepers at Terra Linda.”
“How long have the two of you been working there?”
“McKay has been working for a few months, and I’ve been working there since the 8th grade.”
It seemed to be as simple as a job could possibly be. Judging by the fact that Parker had worked there since he was 14 seemed to indicate that this job wouldn’t need any experience. And the shifts were only 1-2 hours a day, so it would be a perfect job to have while in school. It was August at the time, and I was going to be turning 17 by the end of the month without getting my drivers license or my first job, so this was as good an opportunity as I could get to cross one of those off my list.
“Would it be easy to get a job there?”
“Yeah, all you need to do is go to the Jordan School District website and fill out an application there.”
After a fun day with them, I got dropped off at my house, went through the door and immediately sat down in front of my computer and typed in the address to the Jordan School District's website. I filled out the application and had it submitted. All that was left was the waiting game. Parker couldn’t remember how long it took for him, but McKay said it took a few months before he was notified about his application. I wanted to get working right away, so this was the most stressful part of this whole experience. I wasn’t sure how the whole Covid situation would affect things … if they would need more workers as cleaning was more of an issue now, or if schools would move online again, and there wouldn’t be a need for junior custodians.
On September 4, just a few weeks after I sent in my application, I got a message from John, the supervisor, saying that he wanted to meet with me. It wasn’t necessarily an “interview,” it was more a quick rundown of what to expect from the job. After that, the only thing left before starting my first job was sweeper training.
My sweeper training happened on September 22, and the purpose of this was to show the basics of all of the routes we may be doing; light duty, vacuums; and bathrooms. After all of that, I was finally able to start working. I started as a sub, just filling in when needed, but it wasn’t long before I got my own route and was working every day.
I take off the straps off of my vacuum, then empty the contents from an hour worth of vacuuming into the trash. I get to the main office and punch in my code a second time so I could end my shift. It is very strange how an experience shared by millions of others could have wildly different outcomes and impacts. What so many people will remember about this time period is how unemployment was high, but what I will remember from 2020 is that it’s when I got my first job.
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