Have I mentioned lately how supremely flexible and wonderful the high school is about accommodating Erin's music, travel and work-related learning? Well, yeah, they have been great. She can take Tuesday afternoons off for choir, and alternate Fridays and Mondays off for violin, and the latter three quarters of Wednesday off to work at her part-time job. Two months in Asia? A week or two for a choir tour? A random trip to Montreal? No problem. The school sees the value of this for her and just makes it work.
So today being Wednesday, she was working at the café during school hours. And she had to go from there on an errand to the convenience store for whipping cream. She knows the convenience store cashier from dozens of similar runs she's done at work over the past year or so. So they chat while Erin's checking out and the cashier asks "Are you homeschooling again this year, or going to school?" And Erin says "Going to school, but they don't make me actually be there all the time. They basically let me come and go as I please."
Some guy, a customer, is lingering around the cash too. He quips "That's not going to prepare you very well for a job."
"Uh, well," says Erin "I'm at my job right now, actually." And pays for the whipping cream and heads back to the café.
Touché.
Thursday, September 09, 2010
8 comments:
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That was funny! Love it!
ReplyDeletePerfect!
ReplyDeleteBut this isn't the job she actually wants to do for the rest of her life, right? Most careers need a bit more long term planning and application than running errands for a coffee shop...
ReplyDeleteOh for goodness sake, Anon. Do you follow this blog at all? Erin is just about the most focused and driven 16-year-old I've ever met. She's got a 2-year plan to get into the music school she wants, to prepare her for the career she wants ... and almost everything she does, including 5 hours of practicing a day (in addition to school, work and other extra-curriculars), is about reaching that goal.
ReplyDeleteThe guy's comment was along the lines of "if school doesn't make you keep rigid arbitrary hours, how're you going to hold down a job that does?" First of all, Erin is unlikely to end up with a job that requires rigid arbitrary hours; she wants to teach, freelance, maybe get an orchestral chair, all of which makes for a ton of juggling of mostly flexible hours of self-employment and practicing. Secondly, her part-time job, which she works fairly full-time at during the summer, does have fixed hours, which she handles just beautifully, and which she happened to be working at when he expressed doubt that she'd be able to cope with that scenario.
He sounded like a crank who didn't have the whole story. We run into people like that everyday. I wouldn't give in another thought.
ReplyDeleteHi Miranda,
ReplyDeleteJust read your post, made me laugh. Its amazing to me how judgemental people can be, I work in education and if there is one thing that I have learned, NEVER JUDGE A BOOK BY ITS COVER!
Your daughter sounds like she has a great head on her shoulders and knows exactly what she wants in life. It takes determination to do a lot of your schooling on your own, its not easy. I know first hand, when I was a teenager I travelled around Europe for two years with my parents in a camper van and did my grade 11 and most of 12 on MY OWN. My parents helped when they could, but basically I did it by myself.
Its very easy for us as a society to take things at face value and really there is a lot more to things then meets the eye. Never made it up to your neck of the woods for camping, it was threatening rain and the people we camp with tent and weren't keen on going and my daughters high school schedules an orientation day on Labour Day!! Was not an impressed parent, but needless to say sucked it up and went with the said daughter.
Hope your oven dries soon, am curious to see how it works.
Take care
Cheers
Ann
I just had to laugh at the man's comment. I guess it just goes to show how unconventional I am. My (grown) children thank me frequently for letting them have an unconventional childhood. And yet somehow they have all managed to work regularbhopurs when the need arose. I love how your daughter handled it. Made me smile.
ReplyDeleteBravo Erin!
ReplyDeleteMiranda, you're more nuanced/polite than I ... I'd take a leaf out of my 19-yo son's book and say, "your point is?"...;-)
Deborah