YMCA

Ever been hired for a job for which you were massively under-qualified?  And, by “massively under-qualified” I don’t mean you didn’t know how to do the actual job tasks, but gosh-darn-it, you were determined to learn so it wasn’t that bad.  By “massively under-qualified” I mean you were so inept in this field that the person that hired you must have actually hated you since you were an automatic shoe-in for failure.  Ever gotten one of those jobs?

The summer after my Senior Year of college, I was hired to be the Day Camp Director of the Downtown Division of the St. Louis YMCA.  I was applying for this job because I no longer had a free ride from my parents and I was on an apartment lease until September.  As a graduate of college, I felt too snooty to work at any of my previous jobs, so I applied for this.  The requirements for “Day Camp Director” were previous camp experience (they meant as a counselor, but I had gone to camp every summer growing up, so fuck you, I’m applying), a college degree, and a love for service.  These were true statements about me, so I felt like I could do it.  My love for a warm bed and a roof were big motivators as well.

The interview was tame enough.  I really liked the woman interviewing me.  Her name was Renee and she had a sincere passion for serving the underprivileged community (particularly in St. Louis) because she felt her heart was not set up for corporate pushing.  I respected her instantly.  We joked around during most of the interview and she made a point of mentioning that I didn’t seem to have the exact qualifications they were looking for, but she was going to really consider me.  I left pretty sure I wouldn’t get the job because as she was describing it to me, I realized I would be quite terrible at it.

So, I got it.

To this day, I cannot tell you how/why I ended up being hired.  When I asked Renee about it later, she said to me, “Oh, well, I thought you weren’t going to be great at it since you didn’t have experience, but I liked you a lot and we were going to be spending a lot of working time together, so I decided to give you a chance.”  Read: “I thought, ‘Fuck it, I’m going to quit when you’re a month in because working for the Y is massively challenging, the parents of underprivileged kids in this community hate me because I’m white and I’ve had enough of working for such little money and so many horribly long hours.’ ”

And that’s just what she did.

Before I continue, I should mention that St. Louis is not exactly a safe city.  St. Louis is also incredibly racially divided, or at least, it was when I lived there for the better part of 3 years.  The city was dangerous and the inner city was a stones throw away from my school, yet we only went there if we got lost.  Literally.  I am not speaking for the inner cities elsewhere and I am not suggesting inner cities only have one race that resides there – quite the opposite in fact.  What I am saying is the inner city in St. Louis was dangerous and, in my very personal experience, the fact that I was white didn’t help.

As a note about this post, I should also add that it could be a 4-parter for all of the things that I went through this summer as a direct result of choosing to say “yes” to a job that I knew I would suck at doing.  This job took so much out of me and I was not yet equipped with the ability to say “no” to people or to stand up for myself when I would get physically or emotionally abused.  In no uncertain terms, this job abused me.  And look, the common denominator here is ME, so the job drama I used to always have just got me to where I am now.  I’m not whining.  Yet…

Photosource: babycaredaily.com

The day that sent me over the edge was not the day I had to run 2 miles back to the offices with the sweetest little boy in my arms that was having an asthma attack to get an inhaler I didn’t know I had to bring with me at all times.  The day that sent me over the edge was not the day when all of my camp counselors (when asked to bring just ONE activity for their kids to do so I didn’t have to plan EVERYTHING from scratch while dealing with the logistical nightmare that was this camp day) just laughed at me when I asked what they brought.  The day that sent me over the edge wasn’t even the day when Renee quit with no warning, didn’t hire a replacement for herself and didn’t help me sort out how to do this fucking job at all.

The day that sent me over the edge was the day a very large black lady screamed in my face over a permission slip or something (PTSD has prevented me from actually remembering the specifics of this day- not joking) and I sat there and took it for about 15 minutes while a large group of parents just watched.

Coming back from yet another field trip to the park I had planned so we could play games and bake in the sun, we were late and I had no one I could communicate with (no cell phone with me and no person on the other end of the walkie talkie since Renee quit) to let them know we would be later than usual. We arrived back to a few annoyed parents, but the kids were worn out and that was pretty much all the parents wanted anyway.  Plus, a lot of these kids were on a scholarship since their parents could not afford to pay for the kids to attend the camp, so they were not really in a position to complain about their free child care being 15 minutes late.

For one mother, however, this was NOT ok.  Whatever triggered this depth of anger, I have no idea.  Knowing what I know now, this simply wasn’t about me.  At the time, however, I took it VERY personally.  We arrived back into the lobby and I was checking kids out (parents had to physically sign out kids so that there weren’t people stealing children – literally).  As I was doing this, it was taking some time.  A line formed.

Photosource: peteryoungren.com

The line was not getting shorter and the sweat was beginning to pour.  Anger was mounting.  More time passed.  After a few minutes, the 317 pound black woman began to yell at me.  When I say yelled, I mean this is the loudest I have ever been spoken to and I’m an actor.  She yelled about how I wasn’t good at my job (true), I didn’t have the answers they needed (also true), and that I was a dumb little white girl who had no business being there anyway (only somewhat true at the time, so this was mean). I just sat there and took it.  Parents of other kids watched, snickered, and so she was fueled to get meaner and louder.

I apologized and said it would not happen again.  About what I apologized for or what would not occur again, I have no idea.  Suffice it to say, I was mortified, terrified and helpless.  The incident was over.  I signed out the rest of the kids, went home, and cried myself to sleep.

The up side?  Summer was over 6 weeks later and I could stop working at this hell hole for my $9.75/hr. And this experience prepared me for other incidents in my working life.  But hey, it’s only one Y, so maybe they aren’t ALL like this.  I mean, some non-profits aren’t totally dysfunctional, right?  I HAVE to believe that’s right…

Photosource (and no, I’m not joking): topgaysongs.com

Moral of the story: It’s NOT fun to stay at the Y-M-C-Ay Ay