What People Don't Get About My Job: From A(rmy Soldier) to Z(ookeeper)

R is for Referee
"You can't imagine that I don't care who wins. But I really don't."

I could care less who wins this or any game. My kids always ask who my favorite team is - in all sorts of sports. They are continually flabbergasted when I tell them I don't have one, 'I just want to see a well-played game.'

That is the essence of my job -- to protect something precious. The fair opportunity to compete for something very scarce. The win. It is my privilege to share the game with the best players there are.

I also want to make sure that it is a safe opportunity and do whatever I can to maintain the flow of the game -- mostly by staying out of the way unless I have to intervene to protect fairness and safety. I do all this while hustling to maintain my position, staying calm in a hurricane of emotion, watching a dizzying assortment of interactions and comparing them to the spirit and letter of a rule book that may not be all that consistent or clear at times.

So when you tell me that I've made three calls against your team and none against the other team, you need to know some things:

1. I probably don't even know because I don't keep track
2. Fair doesn't mean everyone gets the same number of penalties or fouls called against them
3. Your team needs to make some adjustments

I know you want me to care like you care about your team winning. That's why there are referees - you can't be trusted to know what is fair. That is why you can't imagine that I don't care who wins. But I really don't.

If you try to make your struggle my issue, your struggle will deepen and I won't accept the burden. Play the game. I'll do my level best to make sure it is fair and safe.

S is for Social Services Worker
"They call us baby snatchers. But my job is to keep your family together."

They call us baby snatchers. We are referred to as "the state" as "the hotline." Our lettered abbreviation is CPS, DFS, DCFS, but it all means the same, Child Services.

We are in the business of people, specifically in trying to save people, trying to save children. What people don't understand is that we most often help families rebuild their lives. Ten times out of ten, we knock on a door and walk into a world of chaos. The families we meet have been under burdens of stress, unemployment, poverty, isolation, addiction, and countless other problems. Our job is to enter that world with them, pick apart the chaos, and find salvageable pieces to start rebuilding a life. Nine times out of ten, we use glue, string and spit, we engage our inner MacGyver, we hustle, convince, beg, borrow, and plead for anything (we have zero dollars)... nine times out of ten, we keep a family together.

People don't realize, don't know, don't appreciate that we are in the business of family. My job is to keep your family together and to keep your kids safe. I will do everything I can, with everything I don't have and everything I do have, to make sure your child stays safe and stays in your arms. People call us baby snatchers. When answering the question of what we do, conversations stop. Friends are wary of us watching their parenting techniques. What they don't realize is we don't want your kids. We want you to keep them, keep them safe, and keep yourself safe.

T is for Telecommuter
"Working from home means I never leave the office."

Working from home doesn't mean "slacking off". It means I never leave the office. I literally start working the moment I wake up, and finish when I shut down my laptop and go to sleep. In between I eat, exercise, see my children off to school. Sometimes I'll throw in a load of laundry. I made the transition to working in my home office a few years ago, and although I was productive before, I find I get so much more done in a day now. I don't sit in traffic. I don't need to pick up dry cleaning, or shower and do my hair before work unless I feel like it. I don't get caught up in non-productive water-cooler chitchat about the latest TV show (I don't watch TV anyway, there's no time). I do miss the face to face social interaction, but think it would be very hard to go back to commuting to and working from an office every day.

U is for Unemployed

"I have never known this desperation."

There are three stories, here: one is about the girl I was; the second, about who that girl became; the third, about what that girl doesn't know. They are all important to my narrative of unemployment. I am sure they are not entirely unique.

In the first, I am in seventh grade. Small (like I will remain). A good athlete, already: a runner and a soccer player. Later that year, I will make the school lacrosse team, having never played before. But right now, it is the start of basketball season, and the first year I'm eligible to play for the school. I am small - this is crucial: I do not make the team. I was cut before they put a ball in my hands. I am my father's daughter. I don't remember what he told me that evening; whatever it was, it refused to let me quit. I got better. I showed up, humbled and irate, at the same summer basketball camps as the girls who made the team. I ran (probably too much). I lifted (also probably too much). I worked with a speed trainer. The next winter, in eighth grade, I made the freshman team - I jumped an entire level. In eighth grade, I believed that raw ability and a ferocious work ethic knew no smallness.

In the second, I am in college - a senior. I've earned a scholarship to play lacrosse at one of the best programs in the country - at one of the best academic schools in the world. I have been hurt, now, for a long time. Hip surgeries, shin injuries, stress fractures - all have sidelined me intermittently since my sophomore year. College for me becomes learning how to be without the uniform. I spend hours in rehab. My backpack rattles with pill bottles - anti-inflammatories of every variety, painkillers, antacids, vitamins (glucosamine, chondroitin, E, B, Calcium +D) that unfairly promise hope. About to graduate now, it has been over a year since I last held a lacrosse stick. I redirected: I win several major university awards for my writing abilities. On my college graduation day, I believe what college graduates should: that I can turn any challenge into success. I have been blessed with talents; I have been tested in how to use them - in how to carry the characteristics of one into the other. I do not believe in fate: I believe that I have done the work, and it will pay off. It has been this simple for ten years.

The last story takes place this morning. Mornings are the easiest part of the day: they follow a routine, one virtually unchanged in over a decade. Wake up. Flex out the kinks. Change. Still half-asleep, guide my mess of blonde into a high ponytail. Slip on and tie up the running shoes. Bound out the door, reluctant at first, still sore, still stiff, a little cold on this early fall morning. Wander down the driveway, stretching a calf against the fence, a quad by the tree whose roots threaten the blacktop. I take a deep breath - and I'm off. This is the best part of my day: it is the only part that is quiet, the only part that is simple, the only part that involves that unique combination of talent (my speed, my lungs, my heart) and work ethic (this run, as so many runners know, is the result of tens of thousands of miles before it). For however long I run, the world goes still. When I finish, I will face a day without structure; a day marked by unanswered emails and phone calls and desperate Internet scouring. I have never known this desperation. I foolishly did not think I ever would. I believed that I was uniquely gifted, and uniquely focused.

I suppose this has been humbling. One can only run so many miles in a day.

V is for Video Producer
"Video is not film. Video is not easy. Video is not fast. Video is slooooooooooow."

W is for Waiter
"If you don't leave me a tip, I have to pay to serve you."

I am a server at a chain restaurant. There are many things most people don't understand about my job. I make $3 and some change an hour. My paychecks end up being around $20 for two weeks, after taxes are taken out. I am one year away from graduating with my bachelors, and most of the people I work with are also in college. I have to "tip out" other employees. Three percent of my total sales goes to the bartender and the hosts. Even if a table doesn't order an alcoholic drink, I still have to pay the bartender. So if you come in and don't leave me a tip, I have to pay to serve you. If you use a coupon or a gift card, please tip according to the full amount of your bill. Kindness goes much farther than anger does. I didn't cook your food, and I did everything within my power to ensure it came to your table correctly. However, people occasionally mess up.

What people don't see is that every second I'm running around in circles as fast as I can, trying to remember to bring a diet to table 23, extra barbecue sauce to 34, more napkins to 26, and the man at 35 is snapping his fingers at me to get my attention while the baby at 21 is screaming and I'm getting sass at table 33. While I'm sweating and trying to fake a smile for you, please don't yell at me because a minimum wage employee cooked your steak to medium instead of medium well. We can easily fix that, and no, the cooks won't mess with your food. Waiting is a fictional movie.

Also, it won't kill you to sit at a table instead of a booth.

X is for Xenobiologist
"Xenobiology is the study of what life outside our planets might be like."

Xenobiology is the study of what life outside our planets might be like. Xenobiologists seek to make accurate predictions about life on other worlds. Most people don't understand that xenobiology is different than simply being a fan of alien movies. While xenobiology can discuss and evaluate aliens from movies, the two are different from one another.

Y is for Yoga Instructor
"I'm not able to just hop into the perfect adho mukha vrksasana."

I am yoga instructor. I love teaching yoga to women, men, children, parents and babies, pregnant ladies.  In a class, I try to respond to some of the specific needs in the class and they vary, whether it's someone with a herniated disc, someone who's looking for a quiet place to process a difficult situation, or someone who heard yoga is good for flexibility and is giving it a try. Students are usually there for some sort of self-care and want to be in class. Many are appreciative, so I usually leave a yoga class feeling rejuvenated.
 
As far as the physical practice goes, It might be a bit surprising to some people that I'm not able to just hop into the perfect adho mukha vrksasana away from the support of the wall. This usually helps my students know that I'm approachable and not their to perform, but to teach. I  don't speak in yoga jargon. I give precise instruction.  I think good and hard before I speak with any authority in class about the spiritual aspects of yoga.  I can pick out a yoga teacher who has no idea why they are saying what they are saying, so I try to make sure I know the purpose of what I'm communicating in front of a paying, attentive audience.
 
There are all kinds of yoga teachers out there. The main thing I love is the actual teaching and connecting with students. On the spectrum of teachers, there are those who love the spiritual aspect of yoga, many who love the physical practice, and many who have found the balance in both. There are a few not so nice yoga teachers who simply love to be bad-asses in front of  a crowd, but they are thankfully few and far between. The yoga community consists of mainly kind and compassionate people, which I suppose isn't too surprising or unanticipated when it comes to yoga.

Z is for Zookeeper
"No, we do not hug our animals."

I think that zoo keeping is one of the most complex, inspiring and rewarding professions, but very few people outside of the field really understand everything that goes into it. Most think that it's all about cleaning enclosures and feeding animals, and while those activities are certainly an essential part of the work, they are only part of the job. In addition to the cleaning and the feeding, zoo keepers also:
    •    develop and implement complex training and enrichment programs for their animals;
    •    work with veterinarians to conduct animal health checks and veterinary procedures;
    •    design new exhibits and enhance existing exhibits with new features;
    •    create and present public education programs and animal demonstrations for zoo visitors;
    •    initiate research projects of their own and assist in the collection of data for research projects led by others;
    •    transport animals between zoos, and manage and observe introductions of animals to new exhibit areas, to new social situations, and to new breeding partners - all in an effort to maintain sustainable captive populations with the best possible genetic diversity;
    •    and a host of other activities - every day brings a new challenge.

On a busy day, a zoo keeper might assist with a veterinary exam, conduct a tour for zoo donors, present a keeper talk to a large crowd, install a new climbing structure in an animal enclosure, observe a breeding introduction, collect behavioral data for a research study, and train an animal to perform a new behavior. Oh yes - all this AND the animals still get fed and their enclosures still get cleaned!

What are some other interesting things that most people don't realize about zoo keeping? There are so many, but for now I'll share three:

1. Zoo keepers today are a highly educated bunch - most positions now require at least a bachelor's degree, and an increasing number of zoo keepers either come into the job with a graduate degree or complete graduate programs while they work full time. At the Smithsonian's National Zoo we even have zoo keepers with PhDs!

2. No, we do not hug our animals. It's so surprising how often we are asked that question! We certainly do bond with and develop relationships with the animals we work with, but they are wild animals. And no, we don't think these animals would make good pets in our homes, but they are great colleagues at work. It's incredibly rewarding to work with an animal so that it participates voluntarily in a veterinary procedure or performs a natural behavior on cue so the public can learn about the species' unique adaptations. And it feels great to go home at the end of the day knowing that both you and that animal had fun working together to accomplish those goals.

3. A lot of what we do for the animals in our care is invisible to the public even though it's right there in front of them. For example, when visitors come to the sloth bear exhibit at the National Zoo, they don't realize that when the bear keepers set up the yard in the morning they sprinkled cinnamon on that log, dabbed spearmint extract on that rock, moved those fallen branches into a new configuration, and buried mealworms and peanuts under that mulch. Visitors might not know it, but every day that exhibit is a whole new experience for the bears.

What people don't get about video, is that they don't get video. Here are the four misconceptions that drive me really crazy:

1) Video is not film. People still goof this one all the time, even in 2011. Film is still photographs on celluloid tape running through a mechanical projector at 24 frames per second. Video is what you see on TV, what you watch on YouTube, what you shoot with your phone. Video is information encoded digitally (unless you still have a VCR, in which case you are either a video artist or very... quaint. Anyway, VHS tapes store information magnetic tape, but we don't do that anymore). So 90% of people calling themselves "filmmakers" today never actually shoot film, but hey, maybe it sounds classier than "videomaker." Maybe you don't care, but I do.

2) Video is not easy. Ok, you can shoot a video about your hilarious cat on your cellphone and get a million YouTube views. But constructing beautiful images and compelling narratives is actually incredibly difficult. I studied it -- at a fancy university, actually -- and I probably pulled more all nighters than you did. We were the only department with keys and 24-7 access to our building. And we logged countless nights in tiny, windowless, basement closets editing, learning from our mistakes, watching our shitty student films hundreds of times until we had no idea if they even made sense anymore.

3) Video is not fast. Video is slooooooooooooooooooow. Video is getting faster, thanks to amazing advances in technology, but I can only shoot and watch video in real time. So I can only shoot a video as fast as my interview subject can talk, and every time someone makes a mistake we have to go back and do it again. Try working an 18 hour nonunion shoot with no overtime... and then do that every day for a week. Editing is even slower. To cut two hours of footage down to five minutes, I start by watching two hours of footage. Good, now I'm ready to begin editing. Every new cut, I watch again, and again, and again, ironing out kinks, masking mistakes, cutting out the thousands of "ums," "uhs," "likes," and dead pauses, just so that my interview subject doesn't sound like an idiot. But then, magically, after hours, days, or weeks, the story runs quickly and smoothly and my interview subjects sounds like a genius. Every cut just pops with dynamic energy -- except when they're invisible. Like ninjas! It's almost like... magic.

4) Video is not cheap. Even the most basic project (see above) is incredibly time consuming, and that means hours and hours of people's time. These folks are highly trained, they keep on top of new tools and programs, they have a finely tuned visual sensibility, and they are cool under pressure. These folks need to get paid. It is fun, but it is work, and we do it all day (and often late into the night). So unfortunately, much as I would love to edit your 20 hours of footage from your conference/wedding/documentary about urban gardening, I can't. But your cat video is totally awesome, by the way.

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