When I initially thought of this question, two jobs came to mind, my first job ever which was working for the family from age eight on, and my last employment from which I retired.

I was eight when I first learned to drive our tractor, a second-hand Case, a huge monster of a machine on which I was so tiny I had to jump up and land on the clutch to shift gears. Mainly I drove it pulling a trailer as workers loaded boxes of peaches as we hauled fruit out of the orchards. Later around age ten we traded the Case in for a new Ford tractor, much smaller and more to my size, but as powerful as the old tractor. Now I could just use my leg muscles to operate the clutch, and shifting gears was world’s easier. Then Mom and Dad purchased a used WWII military personnel carrier and had it modified to work out on our farm: the carriage on back was removed leaving the bare frame of the truck, and a semi-trailer hitch was welded onto the back of the frame. Onto that hitch was affixed a semi-trailer, and now the semi-tractor-trailer was our vehicle to haul fruit out of the orchards, and transport it into town to the fruit exchange where we sold our crops.

I was twelve when I learned how to drive the semi-tractor-trailer. I had to be that old to be big enough to have my feet reach the pedals. When I turned sixteen, the age when I was eligible to get my driver’s license, Dad allowed me to drive the semi-truck into town with a load of fruit. Prior to that, I had been driving our various farm vehicles on the county roads from the house to the various parts of our ranch, all without my license.

When I was 14 or so, I advanced to driving the tractor pulling a disc behind to cultivate the soil around the rows of peach and almond trees, and down the rows of grape vines. I’d start after breakfast around 7:30, and work until noon, stopping to gas up every once in a while. Driving the tractor was a solitary job, there’s only you and the machine and the rows of trees. I spent a lot of time daydreaming, with enough concentration on what I was doing so I didn’t gouge the tree trunks with the disc blades I was passing close-by. During fruit harvest time I’d drive the tractor pulling a trailer loaded with empty 50 lb. peach boxes, while a worker unloaded stacks for the pickers to fill. Later when they were filled, I’d drive the rig as workers loaded the trailer with the filled boxes for later delivery to the fruit exchange in town.

Early in the fall when we started to harvest the almonds, I’d work with the hammer pounding on the branches to knock almonds onto tarps, and with other workers reel in the almonds into the trailer “boat” before sacking them for later delivery to the almond exchange. 

I don’t remember what I was paid, but when I was eight it likely started at the going wage of 50 cents per hour. Every so often Dad would give me a bonus extra $5.00 I think as incentive. I loved that and felt very much appreciated as a real worker. I worked at this job until I left in the fall of ’56 for Fresno State College, and later to the University of California in Berkeley in ’57, and never returned home to the family except for visits.

The second job I loved, was working for a non-profit social service agency serving families with a developmentally disabled family member. California state laws provided that necessary services would be provided to families at no cost to them, and my role as case manager was to see that those services were provided. I had a caseload of some 70 families.

The agency was the Golden Gate Regional Center which had offices in San Francisco, San Mateo, and San Rafael. The Regional Center System divided the state into Regional Center catchment areas, usually based on county district lines. Each Regional Center was a non-profit social service agency that received full funding from the state of California. For a time, I served as a mid-level supervisor, but after some 6-8 years decided to take a position as a case manager and give up my duties as a supervisor. My mental health was the better for it.

My primary responsibilities were to provide case management services to the families, which included an annual review of the client’s needs, provision of services the client or family needed, serve as the client’s and family’s advocate in instances where problems with schools, medical services, or other agencies arose. When I first began, our state-funded budget was large and adequate to provide for virtually all the needs of our families. Gradually over the years, state funding was chipped away and services for our client families began to dwindle, not by choice, but by necessity because the funds were drying up. By the time I left in retirement in 2000 our case managers were in many ways fighting our own agency for services for our client families we’d been providing all along. It was a dilemma because with a smaller overall budget, monies could only go so far, and everyone felt the pinch. The dilemma was worsened because we knew we were breaking the law by cutting back on services. Lawsuits by families all too often resulted in the agency having to fund a service anyway, and funds had to be found from some other part of the agency’s overall budget.

I loved my work with my client families. It was satisfying for me to bring so many life-saving, life- altering, and life-enhancing services to my families. I was the guy on the white horse literally saving some of my families. And it was even more satisfying when I would take on an insurance agency that was breaking the law and denying my client funding for some need that was clearly outlined in the regulations and law. I had the full force and power of the State of California behind me, and a simple letter under our agency’s letterhead brought them to their knees. Such fun that was!

In October of 1999 I had a massive heart attack, that left me with severe heart damage, and the insertion of three stents in my left-descending anterior artery. After I recovered enough for my cardiologist to release me to return to work, I started at the beginning of November of ’99 half time. In December, I returned to full time work. Given my new health status, Barbara basically decided for me, for us, that it was time for me to retire and leave all settings that provided stress on me, so on December 31^st I gave notice that I would be retiring at the end of January 2000.

I spent the month of January closing out all my cases. This involved completing annual reviews for those clients whose birthdays were in that month, and completing purchase of service funding for ongoing services for those clients, and finally writing farewell letters to my client families. My final day of work was on Friday, January 28, 2000. While my true final day was the following Monday the 31^st, my supervisor said I should consider that Friday as my last day and she’d worry about the paperwork for the 31^st. I left a job I loved on that Friday.