True Story: In 1973, I went to Colorado for no real good reason, at least one I don’t want to talk about here. I was Single and just wanted to travel. I always loved the area, and hoped I could find a job there and possibly stay there forever. I started by working spot labor at the Unemployment office. They would have Temporary Jobs available to anyone who signed a list. It wasn’t as if you could choose what jobs you took, but you did have to qualify by having the ability to perform the task. This was before I broke my back, I was 19 years old, and could still throw 250-300 lbs over my head with ease. They didn’t fill technical jobs, it was straight labor jobs, so it didn’t take much more than being there to qualify. The first job they gave me was working on a garbage truck, putting the garbage in the truck. Now this was a great job for the day, it paid $40 per day and that was a hell of a wage for back then. You worked your ass off also for this job. There were not any auto dumpers to pick up the cans of trash and dump them, you had to grab them, throw them up into the back and shake them to get everything out of it. It was a dirty, foul job to do, but the money was worth it! The first week I was able to do this almost every day. On that Thursday, the driver was an asshole; he would literally just slow down and make you run after him to dump the cans and then run to the next set. By 10:00 am, I was so tired that I could hardly keep up, so I decided to stop the shit right there and then. What started as a calm discussion turned into a shouting match, and the man wouldn’t get out of the truck, glad he wouldn’t cause I probably would have went to jail right then and there. After the fight he did stop, because I wouldn’t even approach the cans until he did. I also made sure I was in a riding position before I gave him an all clear, and we still were done before the 8 hour day was finished. He hated to have to pay me, but think he might have been more afraid not to pay. The next day at the office, I told them about what had happened and was told that that particular driver had a history of having his temps quit before getting paid. Bet he claimed he paid every one of them to the company he worked for, since no receipts were ever given back then. I was told I didn’t have to worry about it as they wanted me to go on a different type of job that day. A retired Officer in the Air Force had called in and asked them for 4 men to come out and unload a moving van of furniture and he would pay $10 an hour. I almost shit myself on this one. Back in 1973, $10 an hour was like getting $100 an hour today. He was there and we got in the back of his pick up and went out to the academy area. There we found he actually had an 18 wheeler full that needed to be unloaded. So we lugged and carried furniture all day that day, and finally we got everything done in 9 hours, he was really happy with us. I still remember him telling us he thought we would take 2 days to do the job and had allowed that much in his budget, and was happy we only took 1 day to do the job. He handed each of us an envelope and told us he would take us back to town. To my and everyone’s surprise, our envelopes contained 3 brand new $50 bills. I can’t remember what his name was, wish I could to thank him again, I was able to live almost a month off what he paid me that day. The rest of the jobs that month paid mostly minimum wage and by the 4th week, I was ready to move on. Learned that minimum wage wouldn’t pay your bills and feed you in Colorado, no matter what anyone says. Have to admit, I partied a lot back then, so…… That’s another story. Moral to the story, the grass is always greener on the other side, until you get there that is
Posted on: Sun, 28 Jul 2013 23:43:51 +0000
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