There is honor in all work; I was raised to believe that. Maybe it’s because my parents were both hard workers, maybe it’s because I grew up working class, maybe it’s just because if a person is working that proves he cares, he wants to accomplish something, he wants to be responsible. Regardless of why I feel this way, I know I honor all workers.
When I was a teen we had to move. The neighborhood in which I’d grown up changed. It became too dangerous. My parents found a house in a nicer location but it was small, two stories but only two bedrooms. We had eight people to house.
My father lowballed the offer price. In a hurry to leave, the sellers accepted. We got a fantastic price on the house, but it was going to need more sleeping space. My sister got one bedroom. My four bothers got the other and my parents decided I could sleep on the second story porch. I didn’t mind; at least I didn’t have to share.
That still left us shy one bedroom. My father decided we could add a bedroom to the downstairs. He told me and my next younger brother (we were age 15 and 12) to start digging. It was summer. School was out. Our job was to dig out the area for the basement and foundation. We lived atop sandy soil, so a few feet down it was all sand. Everyday my brother and I were out there digging. We slaved away for a week and seemed to be getting nowhere.
At that time my dad was a labor foreman in the steel mills. One weekend two of his laborers showed up, two Mexican men, average size. They jumped in the hole and in little time they created a solid flat surface the exact size needed. They systematically removed one level at a time, very precise in the process.
My brother and I were good workers, but we had made very little progress in the hole. Two men who knew how to dig holes came in and showed us that skill exists at all levels of work, regardless of the job there is a right way to do it.
I have always known that skill is important in any work, but watching those men was definitely reinforcement that there is honor in all work. Those men took pride in their work, even though their work was simply to dig a hole.
I also believe it is right to pay a fair wage. Shouldn’t it bother us that many Americans today have to work more than one job simply to make ends meet?
We Americans are workers and if allowed to work, we all prosper. Why won’t our government do work programs? We did it to help move us out of the “Great Depression,” why can’t we do it today?
The answer is that in today’s America it is better for shareholders to get profits than for the workers to get paid. It is better for the CEO to make 1,000 times the money of his employees than for workers to be able to afford health care.
As we approach our national holiday known as Labor Day, we should stop giving lip service to labor and start by honoring labor with honest wages, paying workers enough so they can afford to live in the richest country in the world. We need to honor labor not with words and parties; we need to honor labor with respect and money. After all, most of us are laborers.
Gabriel A. Fraire has been a writer more than 45 years. He is the former editor of the Windsor Times. He can be reached at www.gabrielfraire.com.
