Work and my job

I love my job. I have probably one of the lamest college-kid type jobs in the world, but I love it.

What do I do exactly? I work in a bookstore. But no, not a cool bookstore, where you get to put pretty new books on the shelf and help people find great things to read—no, I work in an online bookstore warehouse. Basically, we take the rejects of libraries of all sorts and put them up on Amazon to sell. And my job? I sort through the boxes of books, trying to find each one’s entry on Amazon, and comparing condition and price to see if it's worth selling. If it is, it gets a code and I put it out on the shelves in the warehouse. If not, it gets recycled. And since I get paid more the faster (i.e. more productive) I am and really only need to care about the physical appearance of the book, it’s not like I get to look through books for a living.

And then there’s all the physical labor. Half my day is spent putting books into boxes, shuffling them from one box to another, or carrying around the boxes. Really, this type of job completely objectifies books until the title, condition, and ISBN are all you see in books even outside of work. And when many of those books are moldy, dusty (= my allergies), falling apart, or "bad content rejects"—well, they're not very attractive objects at that.

But I love my job. I shouldn’t—it is a recipe for destroying everyone’s love of books. Even though I can keep books that we can’t sell and look interesting to me, with so many other things in my life, bringing home every book that looks remotely interesting is a formula for disaster. I do bring home about one or two a day of the thousands that I go through, but almost all of them get returned to the recycling bin after I skim through and realize that they weren’t that interesting after all.

Apart from that, it’s a data entry job—a mundane day of dealing with routines, numbers, and other very dull ideas. I should be bored out of my mind sitting at a desk scanning book after book and carrying around boxes. So why aren't I? Why do I look forward to working full time instead of part time when school starts again.

Well, like so many things in life, I’ve figured out that it’s not the facts of something that predicts your experience with it, it’s what you do with it. I don’t yawn my way through the day for a paycheck, but instead pack my iPod full of music and podcasts. Have I ever mentioned that I love podcasts? I’m subscribed to so many of these wonderful downloadable radio shows that can be geeky, informational, free-books-ala-Librivox, funny, or all of the above, and I’m hopelessly addicted to some of them. Those, along with music, are enough to keep my mind occupied while my hands do the mindless routine work of my job. And I’m not the only one—this workplace certainly attracted the sort of people who don’t mind spending most of the day at a desk with headphones on.

And that’s the other thing that I love about the job—the coworkers. It really has nothing to do with the job itself, as it’s not like I’d recommend anyone else to look for a job like this, because unless it’s my coworkers and my personality to deal with them, I have no idea how anyone else would fare here. But I work with a great group of people. Yes, they can be annoying, and there’s one in particular who I really have to try hard to love because she’s just so annoying, but I do love them all. It helps that they’re all Christians of one type or another, and that we’re all in the same general age group—well, mostly. And even more, as I said, this job by definition would attract a certain kind of person. The sort of person who says “Do you have designs against my water vessel?” and “I am not worthy to sit on that couch” and any other of the quietly dry comments that speckle our shared breaks. We’re all pretty reserved, all freely humorous, and all willing to share, eat, and spend time with each other.

How am I ever going to have another job after this one as my first? Like my first course of college, where all my teachers were outstanding, I’m thinking this job has spoiled me. Because of the routine of the job, I get to have intellectual stimulation through books, music and articles/discussion all day, peppered with much-appreciated physical activity. The coworkers and managers/bosses are wonderful to work with. I’m supporting small independent business and capitalism. The pay is good. I can’t think of another place I’d rather work at, honestly.

Someday, I know, I’m going to move on. This is an entry level job, and unless something remarkable happens, I’m going to outgrow it. But if by some chance that remarkable thing happens and I stay at this job for a long time, I’m not going to be disappointed. One of the most difficult things as a new Christian for me to learn was that God wanted us to work—he didn’t intend us for a life of ease and “free time” and entertainment, as worthy as those things are in moderation. We’re supposed to work hard and with joy for the Lord, and now I understand why. As much as weekends come with some relief, I’m always ready for Monday, and it feels wrong when a sickday or vacation gives me gobs of free time. This is how it’s supposed to be, and it feels that way.

I love my job. And I don’t feel at all guilty saying that.