Working. Part 9

I wear a belt, sort of a girdle. You can buy them in any orthopedic place. This is primarily to hold me in. This one doctor says I'm fairly long-legged and I'm overlifting. The men I work with are average height. I'm six three, I was six four when I went in the army but I think I've come down a little bit. It's my own fault. I probably make it harder on myself with my way of lifting. I've been fairly well protected during the past four years. I haven't had any days off because of it. I wouldn't want to face it again, I'll tell you that.

It's a fifty-gallon drum you lift. I'd say anywhere from eighty pounds to several hundred pounds, depending on what they're loaded with. We lift maybe close to two hundred cans a day. I never attempted to count them. They surprise you every once in a while. They'll load it with something very heavy, like plaster. (Laughs.) I always said you can read in a garbage can how a person lives. We have this Mexican and Puerto Rican movement in this area. You find a lot of rice and a good many TV dinners. They don't seem to care about cooking too much. I can't say that every family is like that. I never lived with 'em.

I wear an ap.r.o.n over this. By the time you get two or three days in these clothes they're ready for the washer. Working behind the truck, you never know what might shoot out from behind there-liquid or gla.s.s or plastic. There is no safety features on the truck. When these blades in the hopper catch it and bring it forward, it spurts out like a bullet. Two years ago, I was struck in the face with a piece of wood. Cut the flesh above the eye and broke my gla.s.ses. When I got to the doctor, he put a st.i.tch in it. I had the prettiest s.h.i.+ner you ever seen. (Laughs.) It can be dangerous. You never know what people throw out. I've seen acid thrown out.

They tell you stay away from the rear of the truck when the blade's in motion, but if you did that throughout a day, you'd lose too much time. By the time the blade's goin', you're getting the next can ready to dump.

You don't talk much. You might just mention something fell out of the can or a word or two. Maybe we'll pull in an alley and they'll take five minutes for a cigarette break. We might chew the fat about various things -current events, who murdered who (laughs), sensational stories. Maybe one of the fellas read an article about something that happened over in Europe. Oh, once in a while, talk about the war. It has never been a heated discussion with me.

I'm pretty well exhausted by the time I get through in the day. I've complained at times when the work was getting a little too heavy. My wife says, "Well, get something else." Where the devil is a man my age gonna get something else? You just don't walk from job to job.

She says I should go to sixty-two if I can. I have some Social Security comin'. The pension from the city won't amount to anything. I don't have that much service. Another four years, I'll have only eleven years, and that won't build up a city pension for me by any means.

It'll be just day to day. Same thing as bowling. You bowl each frame, that's right. If you look ahead, you know what you're getting into. So why aggravate yourself? You know what we call bad stops. A mess to clean up in a certain alley. Why look ahead to it? The devil. As long as my health holds out, I want to work.

I have a daughter in college. If she goes through to June, she'll have her master's degree. She's in medicine. For her, it'll be either teaching or research. As she teaches, she can work for her doctorate. She's so far ahead of me, I couldn't . . .

I don't look down on my job in any way. I couldn't say I despise myself for doing it. I feel better at it than I did at the office. I'm more free. And, yeah-it's meaningful to society. (Laughs.) I was told a story one time by a doctor. Years ago, in France, they had a setup where these princes and lords and G.o.d knows what they had floating around. If you didn't stand in favor with the king, they'd give you the lowest job, of cleaning the streets of Paris-which must have been a mess in those days. One lord goofed up somewhere along the line, so they put him in charge of it. And he did such a wonderful job that he was commended for it. The worst job in the French kingdom and he was patted on the back for what he did. That was the first story I ever heard about garbage where it really meant something.

POSTSCRIPT: Several months after the conversation he sent me a note: "Nick and I are still on the job, but to me the alleys are getting larger and the cans larger. Getting old."

LOUIS HAYWARD.

He is a washroom attendant at the Palmer House. It is one of the older, more highly regarded hotels in Chicago. He has been at this for fifteen years. For most of his working life he had been a Pullman porter. The decline in pa.s.senger train travel put an end to that. He is nearing sixty-two. "This work is light and easy. That's why I took it. I had a stroke. I might qualify for something. better, but I feel I'm too old now."

It's an automatic thing, waiting on people. It doesn't require any thought. It's almost a reflex action. I set my toilet articles up, towels-and I'm ready. We have all the things that men normally would have in their cabinets at home: creams, face lotions, mouth washes, hair preparations. I don't do porter work, clean up. That's all done by the hotel. I work for a concession.

They come in. They wash their hands after using the service-you hope. (A soft chuckle.) I go through the old brush routine, stand back, expecting a tip. A quarter is what you expect when you hand the guy a towel and a couple of licks of the broom. Okay. You don't always get it. For service over and beyond the call of duty, you expect more. That's when he wants Vitalis on his hair, Aqua Velva on his face, and wants Murine for his eyes. We render that too, sometimes.

One thing that reduced our intake, that's when they stopped using the Liberty halves. I'm not talking about the Kennedy halves, they're not too much in circulation. They'd throw you a half. He don't have it in his pocket any more. Now he throws you a quarter. You'd be surprised the difference it makes. A big tip is the only thing that is uppermost in any attendant's mind, because that's what you're there for. You're, there to sell service and you only have about a minute and a half to impress the person. The only thing you can do is be alert, to let the man know that you're aware of him. That's the way he judges you.

It builds his ego up a little bit. By the same token, he can be deflated by the right person. An attendant or a captain in a dining room or a doorman-I don't care who you are, if you're President of the United States or United States Steel, if you walk into any washroom, you like to be recognized. If you're with a client-"h.e.l.lo, Mr. Jones"-that impresses the client. This guy really gets around. The washroom attendant knows him. I'm building him up. If he's been in before and is rude in one way or another, I can always be busy doing something else.

I can just separate the wheat from the chaff. I know live ones from almost lookin' at them from so-called deadheads. There's a bit of sn.o.b in me anyway. If you don't appeal to me the way I think you should, I'm not going to slight you, but there could be just a little difference in the attention you get.

Oh yes, there's been a change in fifteen years. Not in the size of the tip. That's pretty well standardized, a quarter. The clientele are different. I always felt that a good servant is a little sn.o.bbish. I don't enjoy waiting on my peers. I feel that if I'm gonna occupy a position that's menial, let it be to someone perhaps a cut above me. It's just a personal feeling. I'm not gonna let him feel that-the salesman or the person off the street. Now our customers are not too liberal. Most people who come to conventions today don't have big expense accounts any more. Everybody feels it all down the line.

It's open now to the public. Young black and white suddenly become aware of this washroom. It's just off the street. They're in here like flies. A lot of this stuff is new to them: "What is this, a barber shop?" It's free. Sometimes you think you're down in the subway. It's a parade, in and out. Some of 'em are real bad boys that are downtown. When they come in, you don't know if it's a rip-off or what it is. It has happened. Seven, eight years ago, it was not heard of. It never crossed anybody's mind.

They just don't know. I'm not talking about young people. Some of the older people, they come from downstate, a little town . . . One other thing has changed in the past few years, the life style, in dressin'. Sometimes you make a mistake. You figure the wrong guy is a b.u.m, and he's very affluent.

It has its ups and downs. You meet a few celebrities. It's always to your best advantage to recognize them. We got a lot of bigwigs from city hall for lunch. The mayor comes quite often. Judges . . .

Most of the time I'm sitting down here reading, a paper or a book. I got a locker full of one thing or another. The day goes. I have a s.h.i.+ne man in the back. At least you have someone to talk to. That takes a little of your monotony off it. Deadly sometimes.

I'm not particularly proud of what I'm doing. The s.h.i.+ne man and I discuss it quite freely. In my own habitat I don't go around saying I'm a washroom attendant at the Palmer House. Outside of my immediate family, very few people know what I do. They do know I work at the Palmer House and let that suffice. You say Palmer House, they automatically a.s.sume you're a waiter.

This man s.h.i.+ning shoes, he's had several offers-he's a very good bootblack-where he could make more money. But he wouldn't take 'em because the jobs were too open. He didn't want to be seen s.h.i.+ning shoes. To quote him, "Too many pretty girls pa.s.s by." (Laughs.) No, I'm not proud of this work. I can't do anything heavy. It would be hard to do anything else, so I'm stuck. I've become inured to it now. It doesn't affect me one way or the other. Several years ago (pause)-I couldn't begin to tell you how menial the job was. I was frustrated with myself-for being put in that position. The years piled up and now it doesn't even occur to me, doesn't cross my mind. I was placed in a very unusual position. It's very hard for me to realize it even now. It took a little while, but it don't take too long, really. Especially when you see other people doing it too. That's one thing that sped it along. If it were myself alone-but I see others doin' it. So it can't be so bad.

"I was a Pullman porter for G.o.d knows how many years. That's why I got into this so easily. When I was first employed, the porter status was very low. Everybody called him George. We got together and got a placard printed with our name on it and posted it on each end of the car: Car served by Louis M. Hayward. (Chuckles softly.) So we could politely refer everybody to this. When I first went on the road, the porter was the first accused of anything: wallet missing-the porter got it. (Dry chuckle.) A lot of them went on pensions. A pretty good pension-from a black man's standard. A white man might not think it's so hot. Others have jobs in banks-as messengers."

People are a lot more sophisticated today. It's so easy to say, "Is the shoe s.h.i.+ne boy here?" Very few of 'em use that expression these days. They make very sure they ask for the s.h.i.+ne man. This fellow I work with-I wouldn't call him militant, but he's perhaps a little more forward than I am-he wouldn't respond if you called him boy. He'd promptly tell 'em; "We don't have any shoe s.h.i.+ne boy here. We only have men s.h.i.+ning shoes."

The man I hand the towel to is perfectly aware of my presence. Sometimes he wants it to appear that he is unaware of you. You have to be aware of him whether he's aware of you or not. A very common ploy is for two men to come in discussing a big business deal. I stand with the towels and they just walk right by, talking about thousands of dollars in transactions. I'm to a.s.sume they're so occupied with what they're doing that they don't have time for me. They ignore me completely. They don't bother to wash their hands. (Laughs.) I laugh at them inside. The joke's on them as far as I'm concerned. Sometimes just for the h.e.l.l of it, when they go back to the urinal, I'll have the water running: "Towel, sir?" "No, I gotta hurry and get back to eat." He's just come from the toilet. He hasn't bothered to wash his hands. (Chuckles.) Truthfully, I don't carry my feeling of menial work quite that deeply that it hurts me. The only time I feel hurt is when I perform some extra service and don't get what I thought I deserved. I'm completely hardened now. I just take it in stride.

The whole thing is obsolete. It's on its way out. This work isn't necessary in the first place. It's so superfluous. It was never necessary. (Laughs.) It's just a hustle. Years ago, a black man at night spots and hotels would keep the place clean and whatever you could hustle there was yours. He did pretty good at it. Talked a little too much about how well he was doing. Well, people started to look into it. This could be an operation . . .

The concessions took over?22 (A long pause.) Uh-when did they start taking over?

(Softly) That I don't know. It happened in many cities. I've wondered about it myself. I-I don't know.

I heard the concession gets twenty-five cents from every attendant for every two towels handed out . . .

(A long pause.) That's what he told you?23 Yeah.

Well, that's a . . . (Trails off.) Is that true?

I-I don't know. I don't question his word, but . . . (A long pause.) I'll make an application for Social Security in a couple of months. I'll be sixty-two. I'm not gonna wait till sixty-five. I might not even be here then. I'll take what I got comin' and run. (A soft chuckle.) I got it all pretty well figured out. I'll still work a little down here. That'll give me something. To sit down and do nothing, I don't look forward to that. There certainly is not gonna be that much money that I can afford to do it. (Laughs.) I'm not well off by any means. To say that I do not need much money now is not true. But I'm not gonna kill myself to get it. I could be a house man here, a waiter, but I can't handle it now.

"Years ago it was quite different than the way I'm spending my leisure time now. I spent a great deal of time up at the corner tavern with the boys. I don't go out much at night any more. n.o.body does that's got his marbles. I read and watch television. If I want something to drink, I take it home with me. When I retire, I guess I'll be doing more of this same thing."

I always wanted to be a writer. My mother was a writer. Sold a couple of short stories. I enjoy reading-thought I might enjoy writing. I thought a little of her talent might rub off on me. Apparently it didn't. Her desire rubbed off on me, though. (Soft chuckle.) Just an idea . . . Most people like to say how rich and rewarding their jobs are. I can't say that. (As he laughs softly, he walks off toward the washroom.) POSTSCRIPT: He is a widower and has five grandchildren. He lives with his two unmarried sisters; one is working, the other is on a pension.

LINCOLN JAMES.

He works in a rendering and glue factory. He's been at it for thirty-six years. "A lot of people refer to me as a maintenance man. But I call it a factory mechanic."

Rendering is where you get the sc.r.a.p-fat and bones-from the butcher shops and cook them into a grease. We receive things people normally don't want. Years ago, we princ.i.p.ally supplied soap factories. But today they make all different products from the residue. Tallows, glycerine, bone meal, poultry feed, fertilizer. The bones usually go to glue. Out of the marrow of the bones is where the glue comes from. People have no interest whatsoever in what they throw out. This rendering process takes it and makes millions of dollars off of it. They export this grease to foreign countries. That's our big business nowadays.

They bring it in by truck. It's unloaded an conveyors. Bones go one place, the fats go another. They take it through a cooking process and this is where we get the glue. It may start out like water, but when it cooks over and over, it gets almost like a syrup. It's just a thickening process.

I started out as a laborer. I became an oiler and from that to repairman. When I labored, I transported the meat and the bones after they were separated. Women were doing that at the time. Today it's automation. No women now. They were eliminated.

The odor was terrible, but I got used to it. It was less annoying when you stayed right in it. When you left for a week or so, a vacation, you had to come back and get used to the thing all over again. I've had people that say, "How do you stand it?" I say it's like anything else. I don't say you get exactly used to it, but it does get less annoying in time. It's not a stink, but it's not sweet either. It's a different odor altogether. Whenever meat lays around for a few days it smells like that. But once you cook it, it changes to a different odor. I can't explain . . .

I sometimes have a little fun with some of the guys. I say, "I work in one of the filthiest places in Chicago, I believe." Some of 'em work in tanneries and they say, "Your place is sweet smellin' besides a tannery." Some of the others kid me; "How do you survive it?" I say, "Did you know the percentage of stuff that we produce here you use it every day?" They says, "Oh? What?" I says, "You brush your teeth with toothpaste?" "Yes." "You have glycerine in your toothpaste. We produce that." They says, "Really?" "Do you eat chickens?" "Yes." "Well, we produce the poultry food, and this is the residue of some of the stuff you see laying around here looking so bad and smelling so bad." (Laughs.) They just look at me, mouth open. I say, "I know you have in time past kissed good with lipstick." "Oh yeah." "Well, look man, we used to supply one of the biggest lipstick factories of all the grease they use. Now don't kiss no more girls." (Laughs.) I sometimes says, "I really don't think you know what's happening." I'll tell 'em about soaps, the stuff they use to fatten the chickens, the glue you use to lick the stamps to go on your letter. (Laughs.) We manufacture here what you use daily.

It's all purified, of course. (Pause.) But you just think about what all this is. Could any part of this stink possibly be used in an individual's life? You wonder sometime. But you search it down and you find it do. Yes, yes. Many other things, if you really knew from where it come, you probably wouldn't be very interested. I had some years in a packinghouse and I see some of the stuff manufactured and I don't relish it too much myself. I happen to be around and know what goes on.

You have to wear rubber gloves, but there'd still be an odor to your hand. You had to wash it real good in order not to smell it when you were eating lunch. The risk of infections and stuff are pretty great because of this contaminated stuff. They provide employees with teta.n.u.s shots every so often. They never had too many infections. Of course, there was a few.

Accidents wasn't too frequent, but sometimes they got burns. Oh yes, we've had some. If you puts the meat in the pot and you would cook this the tank. Pull the residue out-why, we've had some guys get burns. It seldom, if ever, get the face. It hits the chest, down to the middle leg length. It lasted for months before some employees were able to return to work.

I've known them to have six hundred people here. Now they're down to less than three hundred due to automation. Where they used to have five people separating the rubbish and things, they have only one or two doing it now. I'm a.s.signed to breakdowns on these hydraulic pumps. If a lot of it goes bad overnight, I have to get 'em going that day. It's not the same routine every day. You never know.

This plant runs seven days a week, twenty-four hours a day. They have a scheduled five-day week. But many of them work six days and some of them seven days. Sometimes ten hours a day, sometimes twelve hours a day. In some instances, the overtime is compulsory. The equipment's gotta be used.

You speak of my working life? I like what I'm doing. I never been laid off in thirty-six years. I look forward to going to work. I'd be lost if I wasn't working. But I guess after you put in so many years . . .

Some of the younger help, they seems to have the att.i.tude, "I won't be here long." They say, "How long you worked here?" I say, "Oh, somewhat longer than you all." They says, "I don't want n.o.body's job that long." They don't feel like coming to work, they take the day off. Sat.u.r.day, Sunday, Monday, it don't make no difference. I would think they went out and had a big time. It doesn't seem to bother them to take a couple days off. Wherein it was a rare thing for me to lose a day, years back. I don't lose any time now.

I still think it's a wonderful thing to be employed. I don't know how I'd feel without it. (Pause.) But I'd like the experience. After so many years-I would just like the experience of not having to go to work. I look forward to retirement in another three, four years. I don't know what it would really turn out to be . . .

MAGGIE HOLMES.

What bugs me now, since I'm on welfare, is people saying they give you the money for nothin. When I think back what we had to come through, up from the South, comin' here. The hard work we had to do. It really gets me, when I hear people . . . It do somethin' to me. I think violence.

I think what we had to work for. I used to work for $1.50 a week. This is five days a week, sometimes six. If you live in the servant quarter, your time is never off, because if they decide to have a party at night, you gotta come out. My grandmother, I remember when she used to work, we'd get milk and a pound of b.u.t.ter. I mean this was pay. I'm thinkin' about what my poor parents worked for, gettin' nothing. What do the white think about when they think? Do they ever think about what they would do?

She had worked as a domestic, hotel chambermaid, and as "kitchen help in cafes" for the past twenty-five years, up North and down South. She lives with her four children.

When it come to housework, I can't do it now. I can't stand it, cause it do somethin' to my mind. They want you to clean the house, want you to wash, even the windows, want you to iron. You not supposed to wash no dishes. You ain't supposed to make no beds up. Lots of 'em try to sneak it in on you, think you don't know that. So the doorbell rings and I didn't answer to. The bell's ringin' and I'm still doin' my work. She ask me why I don't answer the bell. I say; "Do I come here to be a butler?" And I don't see myself to be no doormaid. I came to do some work and I'm gonna do my work. When you end up, you's nursemaid, you's cook. They puts all this on you. If you want a job to cleanin', you ask for just cleanin'. She wants you to do in one day what she hasn't did all year.

Now this bug me: the first thing she gonna do is pull out this d.a.m.n rubber thing-just fittin' for your knees. Knee pads-like you're workin' in the fields, like people pickin' cotton. No mop or nothin'. That's why you find so many black women here got rheumatism in their legs, knees. When you gets on that cold floor, I don't care how warm the house is, you can feel the cold on the floor, the water and stuff. I never see n.o.body on their knees until I come North. In the South, they had mops. Most times, if they had real heavy work, they always had a man to come in. Was.h.i.+n' windows, that's a man's job. They don't think nothin' about askin' you to do that here. They don't have no feeling that that's what bothers you. I think to myself; My G.o.d, if I had somebody come and do my floors, clean up for me, I'd appreciate it. They don't say nothin' about it. Act like you haven't even done anything. They has no feelin's.

I worked for one old hen on Lake Sh.o.r.e Drive. You remember that big snow they had there?24 Remember when you couldn't get there? When I gets to work she says; "Call the office." She complained to the lady where I got the job, said I was late to work. So I called. So I said, in the phone (Shouts), "What do you want with me? I got home four black, beautiful kids. Before I go to anybody's job in the morning I see that my kids are at school. I gonna see that they have warm clothes on and they fed." I'm lookin' right at the woman I'm workin' for. (Laughs.) When I get through the phone I tell this employer, "That goes for you too. The only thing I live for is my kids. There's nothin', you and n.o.body else." The expression on her face: What is this? (Laughs.) She thought I was gonna be like (mimics "Aunt Jemima"): "Yes ma'am, I'll try to get here a little early." But it wasn't like that. (Laughs.) When I come in the door that day she told me pull my shoes off. I said, "For what? I can wipe my feet at the door here, but I'm not gettin' out of my shoes, it's cold." She look at me like she said: Oh my G.o.d, what I got here? (Laughs.) I'm knowin' I ain't gonna make no eight hours here. I can't take it.

She had everything in there snow white. And that means work, believe me. In the dining room she had a blue set, she had sky-blue chairs. They had a bedroom with pink and blue. I look and say, "I know what this means." It means sho' 'nough-knees. I said, "I'm gonna try and make it today, if I can make it." Usually when they're so bad, you have to leave.

I ask her where the mop is. She say she don't have no mop. I said. "Don't tell me you mop the floor on your knees. I know you don't." They usually hide these mops in the clothes closet. I go out behind all these clothes and get the mop out. (Laughs.) They don't get on their knees, but they don't think nothin' about askin' a black woman. She says, "All you-you girls . . . " She stop. I say, "All you n.i.g.g.e.rs, is that what you want to say?" She give me this stupid look. I say, "I'm glad you tellin' me that there's more like me." (Laughs.) I told her, "You better give me my money and let me go, 'cause I'm gettin' angry." So I made her give me my carfare and what I had worked that day.

Most when you find decent work is when you find one that work themselves. They know what it's like to get up in the morning and go to work. In the suburbs they ain't got nothin' to do. They has nothin' else to think about. Their mind's just about blowed.

It's just like they're talkin' about mental health. Poor people's mental health is different than the rich white. Mine could come from a job or not havin' enough money for my kids. Mine is from me being poor. That don't mean you're sick. His sickness is from money, graftin' where he want more. I don't have any. You live like that day to day, penny to penny.

I worked for a woman, her husband's a judge. I cleaned the whole house. When it was time for me to go home, she decided she wants some ironing. She goes in the bas.e.m.e.nt, she turn on the air conditioner. She said, "I think you can go down in the bas.e.m.e.nt and finish your day out. It's air conditioned." I said, "I don't care what you got down there, I'm not ironing. You look at that slip, it says cleanin'. Don't say no ironin'." She wanted me to wash the walls in the bathroom. I said, "If you look in that telephone book they got all kinds of ads there under house cleanin'." She said the same thing as the other one, "All you girts-" I said same thing I said to the other one; "You mean n.i.g.g.e.rs." (Laughs.) They ever call you by your last name?

Oh G.o.d, they wouldn't do that. (Laughs.) Do you call her by her last name?

Most time I don't call her, period. I don't say anything to her. I don't talk nasty to n.o.body, but when I go to work I don't talk to people. Most time they don't like what you're gonna say. So I keeps quiet.

Most of her jobs were "way out in the suburbs. You get a bus and you ride till you get a subway. After you gets to Howard,25 you gets the El. If you get to the end of the line and there's no bus, they pick you up. I don't like to work in the city, 'cause they don't want to pay you nothin'. And these old buildings are so nasty. It takes so much time to clean 'em. They are not kept up so good, like suburbs. Most of the new homes out there, it's easier to clean."

A commonly observed phenomenon: during the early evening hour, trains, crowded, predominantly by young white men carrying attache cases, pa.s.s trains headed in the opposite direction, crowded, predominantly by middle-aged black women carrying brown paper bags. Neither group, it appears, glances at the other.

"We spend most of the time ridin'. You get caught goin' out from the suburbs at nighttime, man, you're really sittin' there for hours. There's nothin' movin'. You got a certain hour to meet trains. You get a transfer, you have to get that train. lt's a shuffle to get in and out of the job. If you miss that train at five o'clock, what time you gonna get out that end? Sometime you don't get home till eight o'clock . . . "

You don't feel like was.h.i.+n' your own window when you come from out there, scrubbin'. If you work in one of them houses eight hours, you gotta come home do the same thing over . . . you don't feel like . . . (sighs softly) . . . tired. You gotta come home, take care of your kids, you gotta cook, you gotta wash. Most of the time, you gotta wash for the kids for somethin' to wear to school. You gotta clean up, 'cause you didn't have time in the morning. You gotta wash and iron and whatever you do, nights. You be so tired, until you don't feel like even doin' nothin'.

You get up at six, you fix breakfast for the kids, you get them ready to go on to school. Leave home about eight. Most of the time I make biscuits for my kids, cornbread you gotta make. I don't mean the canned kind. This I don't call cookin', when you go in that refrigerator and get some beans and drop 'em in a pot. And TV dinners, they go stick 'em in the stove and she say she cooked. This is not cookin'.

And she's tired. Tired from doin' what? You got a was.h.i.+ng dryer, you got an electric sweeper, anything at fingertips. All she gotta do is unfroze 'em, dump 'em in the pot, and she's tired! I go to the store, I get my vegetables, greens, I wash 'em. I gotta pick 'em first. I don't eat none of that stuff, like in the cans. She don't do that, and she says she's tired.

When you work for them, when you get in that house in the morning, boy, they got one arm in their coat and a scarf on their head. And when you open that door, she shoots by you, she's gone. Know what I mean? They want you to come there and keep the kids and let them get out. What she think about how am I gonna do? Like I gets tired of my kids too. I'd like to go out too. It bugs you to think that they don't have no feelin's about that.

Most of the time I work for them and they be out. I don't like to work for 'em when they be in the house so much. They don't have no work to do. All they do is get on the telephone and talk about one another. Make you sick. I'll go and close the door. They're all the same, everybody's house is the same. You think they rehea.r.s.e it . . .

When I work, only thing I be worryin' about is my kids. I just don't like to leave 'em too long. When they get out of school, you wonder if they out on the street. The only thing I worry is if they had a place to play in easy. I always call two, three times. When she don't like you to call, I'm in a hurry to get out of there. (Laughs.) My mind is gettin' home, what are you gonna find to cook before the stores close.

This Nixon was sayin' he don't see nothin' wrong with people doin' scrubbin'. For generations that's all we done. He should know we wants to be doctors and teachers and lawyers like him. I don't want my kids to come up and do domestic work. It's degrading. You can't see no tomorrow there. We done this for generation and generation-cooks and butlers all your life. They want their kids to be lawyers, doctors, and things. You don't want 'em in no cafes workin' . . .

When they say about the neighborhood we live in is dirty, why do they ask me to come and clean their house? We, the people in the slums, the same nasty women they have come to their house in the suburbs every day. If these women are so filthy, why you want them to clean for you? They don't go and clean for us. We go and clean for them.

I worked one day where this white person did some housework. I'm lookin' at the difference how she with me and her. She had a guilt feeling towards that lady. They feel they shouldn't ask them to do this type of work, but they don't mind askin' me.

They want you to get in a uniform. You take me and my mother, she work in what she wear. She tells you, "If that place so dirty where I can't wear my dress, I won't do the job." You can't go to work dressed like they do, 'cause they think you're not working-like you should get dirty, at least. They don't say what kind of uniform, just say uniform. This is in case anybody come in, the black be workin'. They don't want you walkin' around dressed up, lookin' like them. They asks you sometimes, "Don't you have somethin' else to put on?" I say, "No, 'cause I'm not gettin' on my knees."

They move with caution now, believe me. They want to know, "What should I call you?" I say, "Don't call me a Negro, I'm black." So they say, "Okay, I don't want to make you angry with me." (Laughs.) The old-timers, a lot of 'em was real religious. "Lord'll make a way." I say, "I'm makin' my own way." I'm not anti-Bible or anti-G.o.d, but I just let'em know I don't think thataway.

The younger women, they don't pay you too much attention. Most of 'em work. The older women, they behind you, wiping. I don't like n.o.body checkin' behind me. When you go to work, they want to show you how to clean. That really gets me, somebody showin' me how to clean. I been doin' it all my life. They come and get the rag and show you how to do it. (Laughs.) I stand there, look at 'em. Lotta times I ask her, "You finished?" I say, "If there's anything you gotta go and do, I wish you'd go." I don't need n.o.body to show me how to clean.

I had them put money down and pretend they can't find it and have me look for it. I worked for one, she had dropped ten dollars on the floor, and I was sweepin' and I'm glad I seen it, because if I had put that sweeper on it, she coulda said I got it. I had to push the couch back and the ten dollars was there. Oh, I had 'em, when you go to dust, they put something . . . to test you.

I worked at a hotel. A hotel's the same thing. You makin' beds, scrubbin' toilets, and things. You gotta put in linens and towels. You still cleanin'. When people come in the room-that's what bugs me-they give you that look: You just a maid. It do somethin' to me. It really gets into me.

Some of the guests are nice. The only thing you try to do is to hurry up and get this bed made and get outa here, 'cause they'll get you to do somethin' else. If they take that room, they want everything they paid for. (Laughs.) They get so many towels, they can't use 'em all. But you gotta put up all those towels. They want that pillow, they want that blanket. You gotta be trottin' back and forth and gettin' all those things.

In the meantime, when they have the hotel full, we put in extra beds-the little foldin' things. They say they didn't order the bed. They stand and look at you like you crazy. Now you gotta take this bed back all the way from the twelfth floor to the second. The guy at the desk, he got the wrong room. He don't say, "I made a mistake." You take the blame.

And you get some guys . . . you can't work with afightin' 'em. He'll call down and say he wants some towels. When you knock, he says, "Come in." He's standing there without a st.i.tch of clothes on, buck naked. You're not goin' in there. You only throw those towels and go back. Most of the time you wait till he got out of there.

When somethin's missin', it's always the maid took it. If we find one of those type people, we tell the house lady, "You have to go in there and clean it yourself." If I crack that door, and n.o.body's in, I wouldn't go in there. If a girl had been in there, they would call and tell you, "Did you see something?" They won't say you got it. It's the same thing. You say no. They say, "It musta been in there."

Last summer I worked at a place and she missed a purse. I didn't work on that floor that day. She called the office. "Did you see that lady's purse?" I said, "No, I haven't been in the room." He asked me again, Did I . . . ? I had to stay till twelve o'clock. She found it. It was under some papers. I quit, 'cause they end up sayin' you stole somethin'.

You know what I wanted to do all my life? I wanted to play piano. And I'd want to write songs and things, that's what I really wanted to do. If I could just get myself enough to buy a piano . . . And I'd like to write about my life, if I could sit long enough: How I growed up in the South and my grandparents and my father-I'd like to do that. I would like to dig up more of black history, too. I would love to for my kids.

Lotta times I'm tellin' 'em about things, they'll be sayin', "Mom, that's olden days." (Laughs.) They don't understand, because it's so far from what's happening now. Mighty few young black women are doin' domestic work. And I'm glad. That's why I want my kids to go to school. This one lady told me, "All you people are gettin' like that." I said, "I'm glad." There's no more gettin' on their knees.

ERIC HOELLEN.

I never heard a newsman, when we had severe winter weather, mention a janitor's name. He'll talk about a guy working out on a line, he'll talk about a guy doing outside work. But do you realize when it snows in the city of Chicago, the janitor's the man who gotta get there and keep the sidewalks clean? The weatherman on TV, that big b.u.m, he don't say nothin'.

It's a low blow. They talk about heart attacks shoveling snow. In one of my buildings alone, I almost had a block of snow to shovel-plus the entrances, plus back porches. There's a lot of janitors that keel over in this cold weather. I get a big charge out of these TV weathermen. They'll talk about everybody in the world, "Take it easy. Don't work too hard." And this and that. But there's no mention of the guy that really has to get out there and remove the snow-by hand. And that's the janitor.

At Christmas time they always talk about janitors getting gifts. I have buildings. They have a mailman, right? I'm not knocking the mailman. He gets everything he deserves. He does a lot of walking in cold weather. But we live with these people. I've stayed in the hallway where I've worked every day and I've done these people favors. They'll hand the mailman a Christmas envelope and they won't even hand you a boo. This makes you feel like: What the h.e.l.l is this? Did I offend this party? Didn't I do my work or something?

He's forty-three and has been a janitor for twenty-two years. "I got married in '50, got a janitor's job, and went to work the next day. My dad was with it when I was with it. For no college education you can't get a better job as far as paying is concerned. It's interesting. You got everything from electrical work to mechanical work-plus plumbing. You've got cleaning. The most is heat, though. You got the boiler room.

"Before the union was in, we had to paint, we had to do everything. They didn't get a half-decent wage at all. Now we get a decent wage, we have health benefits, we started a pension plan.

"When you're on call it's twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week." He services five buildings, "about a hundred families I have to satisfy. I'm the good will amba.s.sador between the owner and the tenants. I can either make a building or break it, depending on how you take care of it. Our main concern is to save the owner money."

When I first started out, we had hand fires. You gotta take a shovel and you open the door and you throw the coal in it. You put about ten, twelve shovels of coal. That would hold maybe, in good zero weather, two hours. To make a decent living, if you had three, four, five hand fires in your buildings, you just made one continuous circle from five thirty in the morning until banking time, about ten thirty at night. As soon as they pulled down, you had to heat 'em up, clean the fire and heat 'em up again. And hit 'em again. So I couldn't go nowhere. You had phone calls, man, that rang off the wall. They wanted heat, they wanted heat. I used to shovel two ton of coal a day.

A lot of people say, "What do you want to be a janitor for?" I say, "I haven't got no investment. I come and go as I please." I never got a fifteen-day notice yet-which means it's public relations. If the owner decides he wants to fire you, he has to give you a fifteen-day notice. And the union will replace you with somebody else.

There's two kinds of janitor work-high rise and walkup. High rise, your head man, he's more like an engineer. He carries the same union card I carry. Their job is mostly responsibility. They have helpers: cleaning men, repairmen. He makes contact with the tenants and he's responsible. He's got a clean job.