Because we didn’t get an allowance after age 15, we had to get jobs to pay for stuff. We all mowed lawns for neighbors. Brad got a job as a bus boy at Charley’s Brother in Hopewell. I picked apples at Rocktown Orchards. Kent worked the night shift at Pennington Quality Market (PQM) grocery store. In a crazy way we all kind of helped each other make money. I got Brad working at the orchard during its peak season. He helped me get a busing job at Charley’s Brother, and Kent played a role in getting me a summer job at the market. So during the school year, I would work at the restaurant Saturday and Sundays, and in the summer I spent 40 hours a week working in the produce department at PQM.  The busing job was pretty basic. I arrived there about 2:00 p.m. I would go into the cooler and pull out the lettuce. We would break up the lettuce and soak in some sort of chemical that would preserve it. Then we would melt a large pot of butter and add some garlic and oregano to it. Cut a dozen of loaves of bread. When the butter melted, we would dip the pieces of bread in the butter and place them on cooking sheets. and put aluminum foil over them. We would then set up the bus station: place silverware in each glass, ready to be used. We then had to put red table cloths on all the tables, light the candles, and made sure each seat had a place mat and napkins. We then had to help set up set up the Salad Bar. Once the guests arrived it was all about keeping water glasses filled, getting the used plates off the table, clearing and setting up tables, and checking the salad bar. It was a busy eating spot, so you ran the whole time. The kitchen was run and staffed by hard-working members of the same Asian family from Communist China. When the night was over, we would put everything away, sweep and mop the kitchen, vacuum the dining rooms, and wait while the waitresses doled out the cash tips we received every night. PQM was a different affair. Got there at 7:00 a.m. sharp, unloaded the daily trucked-in delivery of produce and stocked it in the produce room or cooler. Took inventory and then wrapped fruits and vegetables the entire day. Most produce was wrapped and weighed. Tomatoes, bananas, blueberries, celery, asparagus. Most of the time I spent cleaning and wrapping lettuce. Case after case. Day after day. The department was run by Roger Reamer, brother of the store manager. The ladies were very nice to work with, and the only other guy was John Olson. A retired milk man, who had a work ethic that was unbeatable. He used to say to me, “I don’t worry about dying. I figure when your name is at the top of the page, it’s your time to go.” He and a lot of the people who worked there were real down to earth, hard-working, salt of the earth kind of people. And I thought they were great! One woman would get in trouble because she never cashed her paychecks. Her frugal husband, a retired farmer, refused to use her money to pay the bills so she just worked to stay busy. For the most part though, doing these jobs only cemented in my brain the importance of getting an education that meant I could make good money, doing what I want to do, and something I was particularly suited to do.