Labor Day Reflections

Blog41:

          Work … to do an activity which needs time and effort could either be rewarding or backbreaking.  There is work that we simply want to do because it gives us pride and concrete accomplishment in the end.  For instance, a woodworker who embarks on a small or big project sees the progression of his or her work.  S/He may put down a foundation for a fence, and then build it up.  S/He may even want to improve on it by painting it.  In the end the finished handwork stands out to be admired.  On the opposite end, there is work that other people do which is backbreaking … arduous … strenuous, yet doesn’t give joyful returns at completion.  Coal mining, oil rigging, factory producing tasks from work stiffs begin and repeat day in and out.  They require much physical, monotonous effort that makes the mind dreary and boring.  While the finished product from such labor serve meaningful and essential purposes, the hands, the brains and the backs that produce them could not quickly or easily delineate from which output something came.  Nonetheless, work done is work fulfilled.  That’s least of what we think of work.

Inward compensation for every piece of work engaged in and concluded is a much different matter.  The wholesome feeling we experience when we put in respectable ethic into our work defines whether or not the work itself is a reflection of workmanship, work of love and work of art.  The quality of our willingness and effort in completing tasks speaks volumes of and about our character.

           Long ago, my grandma Atang sat me down after she watched me complete a simple dusting task.   I was proud to tell her that ‘work’ was done. “Tapos na po!” I delightfully announced.  Instead of a nod … an approval I had hoped for, Grandma asked me to run a clean, white rag a second time on the window ledges I ‘just finished’ dusting; so I thought!  I was stunned and embarrassed at the outcome of that second dusting.  It returned an awful dirt stain on the ‘work quality test check’ Grandma, in retrospect, was sure, it would generate.  Calmly and lovingly, Lola Atang sat me down.  She explained and described a lesson about work output, work ethic I would never, ever forget.  “When you do something, when you work at something,” she uttered articulately, “make sure no else would have to do it over.  The effort you put into a task, however small or seemingly unimportant to you at the time, should reflect only the very best you could do – nothing more, nothing less.  Your mark, your handiwork … always, must be a work of love and pride.”  Grandma, like always, encapsulated that teachable moment with a thoughtful thought.  I might have been five or six then, but that life vignette wrapped around tightly.  I tucked it all my working life in the back of my mind … in my invisible pocket where no one could grab it away. 

Work … it is a good thing, and a bad thing.  It is what we do and think of it.  It is how and why we do it that matters.  We can live with the thought that work allows us to define the kind of person we are.  We can appreciate and revel in the thought that the quality of output we give could either bring about a grumbling in someone or create a powerful blessing to another.