Today's feel-good media story speaks to simple living

[puglogic]

Love this story about the Columbia University janitor who finally graduated from the university where he'd been cleaning toilets for years:

http://www.pressherald.com/news/Ivy-League-school-janitor-graduates-with-honors.html


"I love Seneca's letters because they're written in the spirit in which I was educated in my family — not to look for fame and fortune, but to have a simple, honest, honorable life," he said.

[redfox]

Wow, thank you!

[iris lily]

Funny, in this morning's local newspaper there was a similar article about a young man who had been the school custodian for ten years. He graduated this week with a degree in education. He had such good rapport with the kids that his colleagues at school urged him to get a teaching degree.

[iris lily]

Last night I watched the new production of Mildred Pierce with Kate Winslett. I was struck by how snobby she and her kid were about waiting tables and service jobs. Wow. She walked out of an interview for a housekeeper job, which I would think would be a good one back in the day. Makes me wonder about her background, I don't think that they ever explained that.

In my own way I am snobby about occupations and work, but I can't imagine looking down on "honest" work like waiting tables and Housekeeper jobs during the Depression. Some easy money work like gambling and prostitution and work on the fringes of those things I think is suspect, they seductive. I know someone who gambles for a living, it's not his trained occupation but it's how he brings in money.

My multi-milloinaire cousin and his wife clean their daughter's school at night. They are night custodians. They do some of the work themselves and they also hire help to do it. That's pretty sobering for their kid, to see them doing that work at her school. That would help to keep her grounded, I think.

[razz]

Neat to read, thanks!

[Gardenarian]

Thank you, what a nice story.