People who don't work don't know what they're missing. But it's amazing how many ways we can find to mess up and aggravate the satisfaction of a good sensible job.

I've done heavy lifting for fifteen years and never missed a day for an injury, but every kid in pseudo-management thinks they should tell me how to do it. Can't these people shut up? Can't we just respect a job for what it is? What is it in us that makes us smug and nasty? I try to make sure my kids notice anybody doing a good job. My daughter remembers the sales clerk at radio shack (good), and the crew of bone-heads at Home Depot (it was a happier simpler time, before we ever went in there).

   As a troubled kid going into college I didn't have the courage in myself to pursue anything with particularly heavy responsibilities. I think a doctor should be paid more than a garbage man because it's a whale of a job, even if the qualifications were lessened, which they often probably could be, for many basic things.

   In education we're increasingly trying to codify trust in people to do things we don't understand ourselves, and can't do for ourselves. It's expensive in other ways too, when we can't trust anyone.