Picking up on the last sentence of my previous post, about things that are important, this next post will be about my latest job. This summer I have found three jobs. I like to say this as often as possible, because it makes me feel important, but clearly having three very part-time jobs does not make me important. The job that takes up the most amount of time is eight hours. The one that takes the least amount of time is two hours. The job that takes up eight hours of my week is providing personal support work to a young man with intellectual disabilities.
In the brief time I have been employed there, I have learned many things. The ‘learning’ I would like to share in this posting is about friendship. One day, while the man I support was out getting a haircut, his mom came over, and while she cooked, I talked to her. In this conversation it came up how she, like many other people, is nervous about speaking in front of others. I tried to tell her how, in my experience, speaking in front of groups is really not that bad, but she told me that she knows how malicious people can be to speakers. Since a good part of my life is spent talking to groups of other people, I have learned to get over it. She countered by saying that I just teach people, that I don’t have to share of myself, and the malice is not so strong.
Her assertion was partly correct. While I have shared in church and with friends, what I do when I teach is share entertaining stories about my interests and activities, but not that much about myself. I began to realize that she can’t talk about her interests and her life experience without giving away really personal details. How lucky am I that I have many experiences and am able to share what I want when I want. Is that luck? Or is it self-protection that prevents really getting to know another person?
0 Responses to “Summer jobs”