Somewhere
recently, I read the suggestion that pastors should take time off and work at a
minimum wage job. I don’t know if the
author of the article was being snarky about pastors in ivory towers or whether
it was a suggestion to get in the thick of things to identify with people
working for minimum wage. I did not
spend time reading the article. After
all, I’ve been there. I have worked for
nearly minimum wage. I know what it is
like. Trust me; it’s not a good place to
be.
I love doing
intentional interim ministry but there is a major downside to being an
interim. Once a new pastor is called and
the interim is completed, there is no guarantee that there will be another
position waiting for me. Interim
positions are dependent upon clergy mobility.
In recent economic times clergy mobility has slowed considerably. But
that is another story.
Three years
ago I found myself in one of those furlough times. There was no sign of something coming on the
horizon. I applied to various businesses.
I sent out résumés and cover letters. I tried networking. I even considered leaving the ministry for
secular employment if I would be hired.
It was a
tough time. Peggy was in her last year
of teaching full-time. We had two kids
in college. We had a mortgage, car
payments and standard maintenance expenses on our home.
Finally, I
was interviewed at The Home Depot and immediately hired as a cashier. I had retail experience from my college and
seminary years. What impressed The Home
Depot assistant manager was my telling how working at JCPenney during the Cold
War I sold a U.S. Air Force parka to a violinist from the Warsaw Symphony
touring the United State by speaking German to the bass fiddle player
accompanying him. He may have been KGB.
On The Home
Depot flow chart cashiers are the bottom feeders of the store. For over a year my hourly wage was 50¢ more than minimum wage. After 13 months it was bumped up another 50¢.
They didn’t give me all that many hours—less than 20 hours a week. The head cashier was not very patient with newcomers
to the registers. Cashiers take crap
from customers because of the action or inaction of associates in other
departments. Some customers are just plain sour. We were motivated by candy bars to get credit card applications so that managers got their chunk of profit-sharing. When there are not many
customers in the store the shift is long and tedious. Cashiers must stay within 10 feet of their
register at all times. (Sometimes I
would go 15 feet, envelope-pusher that I am.)
By that time
we were really feeling the pinch at home.
Savings were dwindling. Our
frills were eliminated. Things taken for granted like life insurance premiums
had to be suspended.
Eventually,
I got another interim position but it was a rural, two-point parish that
provided a low salary and no housing allowance.
I needed to keep working at The Home Depot. By springtime, I was experienced cashier and
the revolving door of cashiers made me among the “senior cashiers.”
I often worked at the register in the garden
center. As a gardener myself, I was in
my element. But I soon discovered I knew
more than the staff from the garden department.
I was a damn cheap garden consultant as I stood by my register on chilly spring
mornings and in the heat of summer.
The interim
came to a natural conclusion and I was on furlough once again. The Home Depot was able to give me nearly
full-time hours. But still, it was a
crunch. I reached 59 ½ and I could draw
on my pension principle without penalty.
Standing on a concrete floor for a full shift was exhausting. I would
come home with my knees aching. I’m sure that contributed to my current
physical state. What really hurt was to have a synod assistant come through my
register, give me big smile and say, “hang in there.” I wanted a job damn it! You bet I was angry
at the church; certainly the administration.
As one might
guess with minimum wage jobs, it is a revolving door of employees. But I also got to know a wide range of
people. These were not the same folks
that I had coffee with during my seminary years. These were not the same folks I would see at
church because because church surely was not on their agenda.
These are not the same folks I would see in my white bread neighborhood.
I acquired a
wealth of new friends. I think of the
young, black woman who was pregnant and couldn't keep working at THD because
the scheduler could never accommodate her need to ride the bus to work. There’s another young woman who watched her
beloved pet ferret die because she couldn't afford to take him to the vet. I have friends who drove many miles to get to
work spending a big percentage of their paycheck on gas. I have friends who have
had multiple, multiple marriages. I have friends who wanted to find other
employment but the schedule was so helter-skelter they could never plan time
for an interview. I have a friend who is
politically opposite from me who must keep schlepping shopping carts despite the
diagnosis of Parkinson’s. I have friends who wanted to work full-time and
qualify for benefits but were told, “It’s not in the budget.” I worked side-by-side with LGBT individuals
and with rednecks. I heard some pretty
tough language. I worked with people with limited intelligence and I worked
with people who left successful professions to escape the rat race. I have friends who have floated from retail
job to retail job just barely making ends meet.
But, they are my homies who I cherish and with whom I share the common
bond of the orange apron. When I return to the store I feel like Norm in an
episode of Cheers.
I hear of
protests in the state surrounding minimum wage and I want to go join them. I know what these men and women are
experiencing. I've been there. But yet, I had the good fortune to fall back
on some things. We had excellent health
insurance. We had another income in the
house. These people do not have that
luxury I had. They are a step away from
being homeless. They can never afford a
flu shot. They may have never seen a
dentist in their life. So they come to work sick. They come to work with their kids being watch
by whomever. They come to work weighed
down with worry not by the future but by what might happen tomorrow.
Oh for that
day when all who work will be earning a living wage. Oh for a day when the minimum wage removes
men and women people from the captivity of worry and fear of daily existence. Oh for a day when there are no longer those
people who accuse those minimum wage employees of greed and sloth. May those people be forced to wear a cap and ask
their former colleagues and associates, “Do you want fries with that?”
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