Final paper

Lauren Szurley

November 25, 2009

Comm. 111

Final Paper

“Would you like fries with that?” “Can I help you find anything?” “Debit or credit?” These are the commonly heard questions we hear as we walk into chain businesses such as McDonalds and CVS and Dunkin’ Donuts and Stop and Shop. We are so used to being on the receiving end of these transactions. But what about those on the other side of the fence?

Some may say, “this individual looks about 40 years old, what is she doing working as a cashier in Walmart?” Or maybe even, “that little punk could have been a little more polite, how did he get hired?” Though they may not be presidents of large corporations they still have their reasons for being there. Their stories may be far more complex than you ever imagined or maybe they are exactly what you think.

“I mean I’ve been here for a while. I’m comfortable here and I’ve moved up somewhat since I started, so it’s working out,” said 20-year-old Ashley Emerson about her shift manager position at Dunkin’ Donuts. Prior to her year at Dunkin’ Donuts, she worked at Circuit City, “I’m used to these kinds of jobs and dealing with customers.”

Emerson is in her second year at Tunxis Community College in Connecticut. She relies on her paychecks and babysits on the side, as well as the child support that her grandmother [her primary caregiver for most of her life] receives from her father to pay for her education. “I’m not completely alone when it comes to paying for college but a big chunk of my paychecks go into the apartment.” She is engaged and has an apartment with her fiancé. “It’s not bad, small one bedroom and one bathroom apartment. We’re trying to save up and look for a better place but we’ve been saying that for a while,” she laughs. Emerson doesn’t want to be at Dunkin’ Donuts forever, but for now, until she has a degree in child education, it is what gets her by.

Then there is the case of workers who are proud of themselves and how far they’ve come. Take Stephen Blanco, 29 years old. He has been working for CVS since he was. This wasn’t always his intention however. “I went to a community college in Jersey where my fathers lives, turned out it just wasn’t for me.”

Stephen moved from Connecticut to New Jersey and then back to Connecticut where he currently resides. He tried college for two semesters and “hated every second of it.” So Blanco decided to move back up to Connecticut and live with his mother. He reached out to his old manager at CVS and she happily rehired him. He did not even think about trying another school, he figured he would just work from there on out, though he never expected to be at CVS forever.

He started out as a typical cashier. “I did regular stuff, like ring people out and stock shelves and clean up.” After a few years, Blanco’s manager was transferred to a brand new store and she asked him if he’d like to go with her as a shift leader, entailing more responsibilities and larger paycheck. “I of course said yes and have been there ever since.”

Blanco started as a shift B which allows you to open and close and have keys to the store but was once again promoted to shift A which gives him a little more leadership and responsibilities like taking the deposits to the bank. There are rumors about a possible assistant manager position opening up at his current CVS and Stephen has high hopes. He’d like to continue climbing the CVS corporate ladder and manage his own CVS one day; with his experience and seniority it is definitely in the cards.

Emerson and Blanco have these jobs because it is how they live. They have bills to pay and are working to live, which is unlike someone like Marc Teal, age 18, a freshman in college. He comes from a family who is in the upper middle class and has never really had to worry about money, so getting a job was more about instilling values and a learning experience.

“I got a job as soon as I could, shortly after my 16^th birthday, my dad really encouraged me to and now I’m thankful he did.” I used to work after school about three days a week [at The Market Basket] and now I work when I come home during winter break and summer break.

“I’m not paying for my college tuition or anything but it’s nice to have my own money that I can spend on whatever.” Teal says that his manager will continue to hire him back over his breaks for as long as he’d like. He is majoring in business and has no future plans in The Market Basket but for now, it keeps money in his pocket and gives him something to do when he’s home. “It’s not my favorite place to be but it’s familiar and they keep taking me back during breaks, so why go anywhere else?”

Then there are those like Sarah Patrell. At 55, she has two full-time jobs that she has to juggle. By day, she works as a clerk at JC Penny’s and by night she is a shift leader at McDonalds. She came here from Puerto Rico in the early 1970’s with her aunt and cousin. They moved to Hartford, Connecticut where she attended where high school but was held back a year because her English was poor.

After high school, she had a slew of jobs, working anywhere that was in walking distance from her one bedroom apartment with her aunt and cousin. “I have bounced back and fourth between many convenience store and grocery stores and clothing stores.” She is currently between her two jobs, McDonalds who she’s been with for some time now and JC Penny’s a recent second job [prior to that it was CVS] “I believe living this way has made me a strong woman, but I am not so young anymore and it is exhausting.”

She shyly admitted that she does live paycheck to pay check and her and her boyfriend George are able to get by.

“Then, I did not know how important college would be, I was never told I needed to go to college, I get by okay now but I tell everyone young person I work with to go while they can.”

Profile Interview

Standing at four feet, eleven inches, 19-year-old powerhouse, Alexis Veith shrugs her shoulders and states, “I had a lot of help; when we work together as a team we succeed” when talking about her game winning goal. Though the season hasn’t been going as well as the University of Rhode Island lady Rams would have hoped, they are still playing very strong.

Veith has been (playing soccer) “for as long as I can remember.” She received the MVP award during her senior year of high school as well as All-American. All four years in high school, her team won the Berkshire League Championships. Veith was also ranked number one player in the league for these four years. Even in the off-season, she could be found playing soccer for a team called Oakwood.

Her freshman year at the University of Rhode Island, Veith scored a total of two goals and started almost every game. She is very modest about her accomplishments but realizes that she possess great skill, skill that she has worked on for a large part of her life.

Though she always knew she would play soccer in college, the reality of it is exciting. Veith finds that being part of the Lady Rams has made her a strong, well-rounded individual. She has made some great friends and has traveled some interesting place. “Just recently, we went to Missioiri and Kansas. Though we never get to do much when we travel, besides play, it’s cool to visit because I probably wouldn’t go if it wasn’t for soccer.”

When asked about her future plans with soccer, she sounded a little unsure. “Maybe I’ll go on to play professionally, but it’s too early to tell.” With a major in biology, Veith has no light load. She is a dedicated young woman to choose such a grueling major on top of her tight schedule. Between lifting, homework, practice, labs and games, it’s a surprise that she has time for her studies. Though she wouldn’t reveal her GPA, she shyly smiled and said, “I did pretty well,” when asked about her academic standing.

Interview

“She means the whole world to me,” Katlyn Proctor beams as she speaks about he sister. How many people do you know that can say that about their siblings? Katlyn describes her sister as her ‘rock’ and her ‘go to person.’ This is somewhat surprising because growing up; Katlyn was a bit of a mother figure to her younger sister, Alexe. Generally, you would think Alexe may resent Katlyn but they are as tight as ever, “it’s hard to stress how important she is to me,” said Katlyn.

When Katlyn entered the sixth grade, her parents “sort of checked out of parenthood.” They had Katlyn very young and Alexe shortly after, so now that Katlyn was (to their standards) old enough to take care of herself and her sister, she had to grow up quickly. Katlyn holds a lot of anger towards her young-hearted parents and even admitted, “I’m really bitter towards them.” The day Katlyn was old enough to get a job, she had two and every paycheck she received went straight to her parents. She feels as though she lost some of her youth because she had to stay home and take care of Alexe and had to balance out going to high school and having two jobs, she did not have much time to be a free-spirited teenager.

Now, her parents are in the middle of a divorce, which Katlyn had said that both her and her sister have been expecting for a while, but it is becoming more of a burden on Katlyn and Alexe. The battle started last year while Katlyn was a freshman here at Roger Williams and Alexe was a senior, stuck at home in the middle of all of it. It killed Katlyn to know that Alexe was stuck at home dealing with it on her own, but she admitted that she found Roger Williams to be an escape and a comfort away from her contradicting parents. Both parents were pulling her in different directions and it seemed as though she felt like she abandoned Alexe when she said “[Alexe was] fighting a one-man battle when we were always on the same team.” Luckily Alexe is now a freshman at Keene State University in their home state of New Hampshire, but at least she is away from her battling parents and out of the house hopefully finding comfort and an escape as Katlyn did.

Mad As Hell

It seems as though Joe Wilson and Glenn Beck have something in common, they are not fans of President Barack Obama, or at least that's the image they are giving off. Joe Wilson was extremely out of line and extremely unprofessional when had diarrhea of the mouth and blurted out "LIAR" in the middle of President Obama's speech. Obama seemed taken aback and disrespected, but carried on with his speech. No matter how Joe Wilson feels about the President and his proposals, he was in the wrong and just ended up making himself look like a fool. As for Glenn Beck, he is also entitled to his own opinion but his claims seem a little out of whack as well, which based on the reading did not seem something out of character for him. He seems to exaggerate and make irrational claims. Saying that Obama hates white people would be like saying any other past president hated black people. It seems as though just because Glenn Beck is white and Obama is black, he is trying to stir the pot. As a white woman, I can confidently say that I do not believe President Obama has a “deep seated hatred for white people or white culture.” Though I can’t speak for anyone but myself, I do not think that many other educated Caucasian would agree with his statement either or at least not to that extent.

It just makes me wonder if the road between “black and white” will ever be paved. Not be a pessimistic but it seems that though racism will never completely go away because children generally carry their parent’s values into their families when they grow up, which makes a vicious cycle that seems endless.

Waking Life 9/8/09

Language is something that although may be different depending on the country, is universal. Everyone has means to communicate. Without language, we would be very isolated individuals. The exercise we did in class was the perfect display of this. The first example was the most simple; draw a box, and the student drew a box. But then it got more complicated, like draw a home, it was a box with a roof, a few windows and a sun, exactly what you’d expect to see. The last task was to draw something (not in the English language). Once it was described to him, he executed it well. This exercised demonstrated the importance of language and communication. The student was able to follow the instructions he was given and draw everything on the board until he was given the directions in Spanish. Then he was unable to draw the object. It was the same directions, but in a different language. This made the two students unable to communicate. Language is bigger than just communicating because it is part of our culture and the way we live. In the clip from Waking Life, the woman says that she believes language came out of the frustration of being isolated and the longing for human connection. This is exactly how language budded because if we still had no language today, it would be a lonely and simple place.