This I Believe

I recently wrote a recommendation for a young man who spends his summer interning at a local university studying “computational molecular modeling” and the “ions of a zeolitic framework.” The fact that I have no idea what those phrases mean did not stop me from including them in his recommendation, and my hope is that they impressed the people at MIT as completely as they befuddled me.

This young man is not alone in his race for professionalism. As a teacher of “Accelerated” English 11 students, I spend countless fall hours writing letters for those interested in early decision options at our nation’s finest universities. I teach students daily who work for computer companies, Internet startups, and hospitals. And these kids aren’t sweeping the floors. The experiences they are garnering now are meant to increase their value in the eyes of colleges and scholarship committees as well as provide “real life” working opportunities. I think this is great, except. . . well, except that I don’t. I worry what these high-achievers are missing by not having the kinds of summer jobs I had – and everyone I knew had – way back when.

Margaret Fuller once warned that “Men for the sake of getting a living forget to live,” and although learning how to properly cut grass or patch holes in drywall do not wholly comprise “living,” they are a part of it. More important than these skills, however, is the simple experience of working with different people and experiencing different environments.

During the summer between my junior and senior year, I was a maintenance worker for a local Board of Education, and I got to know several “characters.” It took my entire three month “internship” for me to figure out why Bo would have me sign his wife’s name to his weekly check, and why, when we drove the Board truck to his house for a long lunch he’d always hide the truck in his garage with the door down. I learned not to “act smart” as Fred did, because everyone would hate you. I learned from caddying at a country club that many people became rich by really caring about losing a golf ball that cost a buck-fifty. From being a waiter at the same club I discerned that a “Men’s Grill” is really just for men, and that some people bet more on bar dice than your average waiter makes in two weeks. As a paperboy I found that a roll of kalachi makes for a pretty good Christmas tip, and that some people will pretend to have already paid you when they have not, this even though they probably realize the deficit would come out of the pocket of the skinny kid in front of them.

Others taught more positive lessons. When a titan of the community asks for your advice on a golf shot, or simply asks about school, or your hobbies, you learn how to make people feel important. When a maintenance worker refuses to go home on time because the job hasn’t been done correctly yet, you learn the value of work and the satisfaction that it brings. And when a supervisor reams you out for lazily pushing a broom with one hand instead of giving it the proper two-handed, forceful motion, you learn that there is a correct way to do even the smallest tasks. Being on time, the joy of seeing the sun rise as you walk down the first fairway, the physical pleasure of exhaustion from hard work — these are the beauties of summers spent not in a lab or a clinic, but in the world.

My students impress me with their intelligence and drive, and yet, I still want to pull them aside and ask them if their ultra-serious summer jobs can’t wait. Isn’t there plenty of time for computational molecular modeling later? Say, when you’re an adult? They would laugh at that, I think, as they run to their next Advanced Placement class. Harvard awaits, and Harvard, they are sure, doesn’t want any grass cutters. Sadly, they’re probably right.