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Your Job Doesn’t Require a Vest or Apron: Is there anything sadder than the old guy in the vest who greets you at the Home Depot or Wal-Mart? That seventy-eight-year-old guy who’s making minimum wage to hand you the flyer of what’s on sale that week?
I want you, So
The close cousin to this guy, except stationed at the exit instead of the entrance, is the receipt checker/security guy. I’ll head over to the Home Depot and buy 129 finish washers, thirty-seven joist hangers, fifty-one TICO clips. Inevitably, the receipt will be twenty feet long, and the guy with the GED and the lazy eye will give it a glance and a cursory marking up with a highlighter, then send me on my way. His job is to make you pause for a moment and if you don’t start sweating or make a run for it, he’ll let you pass. These guys aren’t security. They’re always overweight, wearing ill-fitting clothes, and missed three out of five of their belt loops. The only weapon they’re carrying are way too many keys. This is just the corporation saying to the insurance company, “But we had security posted at the door” when something does go wrong. This guy is the human equivalent of the plastic owl on top of the seafood restaurant. And as intelligent.
All right, kiddies, tally up your score: How did you do? If you fall on the successful side of things, well good for you. Just prepare to get sued.
As a guy who has had multiple jobs and multiple careers, please let me pass down a little fatherly advice in this arena. Having multiple gigs is a good thing. There is a certain kind of math that goes into this approach. One job is what most people have and that can either be all you need or not nearly enough. Having three jobs usually means they all pay shit. But when you cross over to a place where you have four jobs, chances are you are a rich person. No one can put in the time to work four minimum-wage jobs to make ends meet. But they might be able to pull off three. So four or more jobs means you’re the entrepreneur/businessman/real-estate mogul/celebrity. You’re serving on the boards of several companies.
As far as the multiple gigs, to me it’s about even numbers. One job, even if it does pay well, can be mind numbing. This is the kind of job where you work at a postal sorting facility from age twenty-one to forty-three and then kill yourself and/or several coworkers. Three is just too much for too little return. Go with two so you have variety and aren’t bored, or go with four so that you have so many plates spi
But take heed: Real entrepreneurs don’t call themselves entrepreneurs. I’ve met several super rich guys, the true one-percenters, at some of my vintage race events and when you ask them what they do they all say “a little of this, a little of that” or “I had a company and I sold it.” Those vague answers mean the little of this and little of that is done from a helipad on their yacht. It sounds a little defensive to constantly call yourself an “entrepreneur.” That’s a little like “right now.” It means you haven’t had a salary in years. Every time you say “entrepreneur,” you lop twenty thousand off your pull for the year. I’ve met several self-proclaimed entrepreneurs who want advice from me on starting a business, since I’ve started several. But once I start digging into their schemes, I come to realize they’re selling candles or e-cigarettes on Craigslist from their parents’ basement.
So I’m not going to tell you to “follow your bliss.” Yes, it worked out for Daddy, career-wise. I knew I was fu
When choosing your career path, it’s important that you figure out who you are and what you’re good at and go in that direction. Try different things. Don’t pick one career idea when you’re thirteen and devote your life to it. If you put your eggs in that one basket, you’ll likely be a failure (unless that career is putting eggs in baskets, in which case, go nuts). Your career will find you, not the other way around. It will be based on the inherent strengths you have. If you’re Lebron James, the NBA is a great choice; if you’re Da
Factor in all the aspects before you pull the career trigger. Natalia, you once told me that you wanted to be a schoolteacher. I then had to explain to you that teaching is indeed a noble profession, just not one that pays. I remember having a sit-down to say, “You may want to be a schoolteacher when you grow up, but you won’t be in a house in the hills like Daddy and driving a loaded Audi like Mama if you do. You’ll have a condo in Sherman Oaks and be driving a Jetta.”
I’m not poo-pooing an average middle-class job and income. I just think we need to have a little more realism about that life. During career day when the fireman, policeman and nurse are talking about their jobs, we should take the class out to the parking lot to show the kids what those guys drove to the school that day. That way they’ll know how little we actually pay those people we routinely refer to as “heroes.” If we really walked the walk, they’d be able to roll up to the school in a Jag.
Now I know that, by nature, kids understand the cost of things. Especially you, my children. As I mentioned earlier, you treated the cars in Jay Leno’s garage like the rack of candy bars at the grocery-store checkout. Remember, Natalia, when we went to Lowe’s to pick out a new light for your room?
We were in that section where they have a hundred and fifty lights dangling from the grid on the ceiling. I asked you to pick out which one you wanted. With no hesitation or thought, just an instant gravitational pull, you pointed to the one that was two hundred and nineteen dollars.
I was blown away. This is Lowe’s; I was unaware they even had an option this pricey. I didn’t even know they made lights over one-fifty that didn’t have fans attached. The lights at Lowe’s start at around eighteen bucks and average thirty-nine. They’re all stamped out in China. But you found the one that was the shiniest, with all the glitter and spangles. Seven-year-old girls are like largemouth bass. Everything is a lure to them. If it winks at them, they buy it.