The Lemon Life | online magazine offering a fresh perspective on post-grad life.

Words by: Casey Robertson

Image by: Hugo Arias

When you’re a university student, the term “summer” seems much more expansive than the summers that bridge each high school year. While high school summers often consisted of the months of July and August, - and if you were really fortunate, maybe a bit of June, - university summers are often twice as long. Consequently, there is a considerable amount of time at your disposal that you can spend in whichever manner you desire.

During my years in university, I had two very different summer experiences. After finishing my first year, I was unsure what to do. So I just came back home. I visited with some friends from high school. I attempted to find a summer job, but didn’t have much luck, so I taught the odd music lesson and enjoyed the break from school.

After completing my second year, I had a much different experience. I spent the month of May at my apartment in Ottawa looking for a job. After enduring a rather isolated month, most of my friends having gone home for the summer, I sent out resumes to virtually every place that I could find to be hiring, and even many that were not. Finally, with no solid prospects in the near future I, too, returned home in June. With three months left, I decided to look for a job around home. After a couple weeks of looking, I was eventually hired for a factory job. I should have been suspicious of being offered the job in the parking lot, before even entering the building. Funny, the things you’ll do for money.

This turned out to be one of my worst summers. I worked in a factory that did outsourced work for General Motors, but, in fact, the company that hired me was itself outsourced by this outsourced factory. Sound confusing? Well, that just means instead of getting $28 an hour, I was paid $8.50 for the same work. I worked at this job from 6:30am - 2:30pm, six days a week, until late August. Needless to say, it was quite an experience. The work was mundane, repetitive, and exhausting, but more than anything, what bothered me was the fact that this union-free factory seemed to run on a chain of bullying.

I was fascinated that during the twenty-first century, a place of work could be so volatile. Everyone seemed to think they would have better results by threatening those directly under them. Since I was leaving soon, the “Someone’s going to lose their job” line didn’t resonate much, but I did really feel for those who truly needed their jobs. I realized too, that with a job such as this one, you can work hard, be competent, and still easily encounter daily, morale-lowering hassles. I recall a particular incident where a foreman tried to call me out for incorrectly spelling “rear” on a box, until he realized it was his mistake. With experiences such as these becoming a daily occurrence, my three-month tenure with this factory seemed like an eternity.

Needless to say, I do not look back on this particular job fondly. Yet, working in such a volatile environment gave me a greater appreciation for the fact that I was able to return to school and continue my education. Many students and graduates are fortunate to never have to experience what many of the working class must endure on a day-to-day basis. Through countless circumstances, many just do not have the opportunity to attend university, and end up working a lifetime of unstable jobs. I worked beside some very bright people during this time, some with many years on me. They told me countless horror stories of what life without an education could be like, as well as numerous reasons why returning to school in the fall was the best possible thing I could do. At times, life may be difficult, but one should never lose sight of how fortunate he or she is to have had the opportunity to attend university. And that’s what I learned on my summer vacation.

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