Why I Don't Chew Gum

I was a senior in high school before I got my first job. I just...didn't feel the need to do it earlier. When I finally decided it was time, I knew I didn't want a job in food, retail, or child care. I also didn't want a job that would take up too much of my time. Very few of my friends had jobs, and I didn't want to be alienated from them just because I was a working woman now. My friend Whitney had a job as a janitor at a middle school, and I figured it might be a good fit for me because:

1. You only had to work two hours a day

2. You never worked weekends

3. I already had a friend who worked there

4. Because I was a girl, I was assured I would never have to do the "gross jobs"

So my mind was made up! I decided to apply. Now, by apply I mean I simply walked into the janitor office, asked for a job, and then they gave me one. They made me fill out an application after I got hired so it could look like they did real paperwork, but don't be fooled, they didn't. Sometimes I'm amazed I actually got paid. Now let's review a few things about this job:

1. It was a janitor position at a middle school

2. It was the middle school that I had attended just a few years earlier

3. My sister was currently attending that school

4. Everyday I either saw a middle schooler I knew, was related to someone I knew, or was just generally awful.

Despite a few setbacks it really was an ok job. It was extremely satisfying to someone as obsessive compulsive as me to actually be able to see the progress of my work. For example, when vacuuming a classroom COMPLETELY covered in glitter, I could really see how much progress I had made. This made me feel good and useful. I also worked on the same floor asWhitney, and we had a lot of fun. When the summer came we worked more hours and went through the school room by room. The first "crew" would go to a room and scrub every chair and desk before cleaning the whiteboards and walls, when needed. Then the floor crew would come in and deep clean the floors. I was on the floor crew, along with one other kid, Morgan. Now Morgan was only in 9th grade at the time, and nobody liked him. Not even Whitney, the nicest person I've ever known, could stand to be around him for more than 10 minutes. I was selected to work closely with Morgan because:

1. He obviously liked me. He showed this affection for me by continually making sexually suggestive comments to me in front of everyone.

2. I was too nice at the time to be openly mean to Morgan.

3. I was the newest janitor and therefore, didn't have any say in anything

So I spent the whole summer alone in a room with Morgan. My job was scraping gum out of the carpet. I was armed with only an orange scented solvent, and a putty knife. I would pour a little of the oily, orangey liquid on the hard and gray gum, and then scrape and chip it out of the carpet using the putty knife. It really was miserable work. Everyday I would come home stinking of orange cleaner, and had specks of gum on my clothes, in my hair, even in my arm hair! And once you started scraping the gum away, you could smell the original flavor that the gum once had. The fruit flavors were the worst; their smell could last an eternity. I'm sure my attitude was made worse by the fact that I was furious with my work situation, and furious that people spit their gum out onto the floor. How does that happen? If I imagine really hard I can think of a scenario where your gum might fall out of your mouth and onto the floor, but why didn't you pick it up? Why? Why? Why are you so awful?

I used to like gum, but somewhere between wearing it and smelling it while being told how awesome it would be to bang me by a 15 year old... I lost a taste for it.