My Job
Experience
In university I had a part-time job at a shop
downtown that sold doughnuts and coffee. Situated on a block where a dozen buses
stopped, it catered to commuters (通勤者) who had a few minutes to wait for their
bus.
I poured coffee in takeaway cups and patiently waited for
customers who’d point through the glass case and say, "No, not that one, the one
two rows over."
Every afternoon around four o’clock, a group of
schoolchildren would burst into the shop, and business would come to a stop.
Adults would glance in, see the crowd and pass on. I didn’t mind if the children
waited for their bus inside where it was warm and dry. I was not working on
commission (抽佣金), and hey, sometimes a kid would have 25 cents to
spend.
I came to know the children pretty well. The older girls
would tell me about their boyfriends; some of the younger ones would talk about
school and show me the drawings they’d done in class. The boys were too reserved
to share their secrets, but still, they’d wait every day in the shop until their
bus came.
Sometimes I’d hand out a bus fare when a ticket went
missing--always repaid the next day.
When it snowed, the kids
and I would wait anxiously for a very late bus. They’d call their parents to let
them know that they were OK. At closing time I’d lock the door, and the kids and
I would wait in the warm shop until their bus finally arrived.
I
gave away freely a lot of doughnuts on snow days.
I enjoyed my
young friends, but it never occurred to me that I played an important role in
their lives--until one Saturday afternoon when a serious-looking man entered the
shop and asked if I was the girl who worked on weekdays around four o’clock. I
admitted it was true, and he identified himself as the father of two of my
favourites --a brother-and-sister team.
"I want you to know I
appreciate what you do for my children. I worry about them having to take two
buses to get home. It means a lot that they can wait here and you are keeping an
eye on them."
I was touched. I told him it wasn’t a big deal,
that I enjoyed the kids.
"No, you don’t understand. When they’re
safe. It is a big deal. And I’m grateful."
So I was the Doughnut
Lady. I not only had received a title, I had become a landmark.
Now I think about all the people who keep an eye on my own children when
they venture out into the world. Many of them I never hear about, and some I
learn about only by chance. It feels odd to learn of the life my kids have apart
from me. In their comings and goings they developed relationships with adults,
and those adults, and those adults become, well, Doughnut
Ladies. |
