This chair doesn’t look like much, but it’s a rocker I’ve had since I was small enough to fit in it. It originally had red leather-like upholstery, but it became worn and eventually split–much like it is now. The difference is, back then my grandpa took it into his workshop and reupholstered it. It’s a sturdy rocker with a solid wooden frame, heavy springs in the seat, and thick cotton batting in the seat and back. It’s still in great shape for my Grands to use, but there’s no grandpa to fix the split this time. I’ll tape it and use a seat cover, so I don’t lose the work of Grandpa’s hands, and the story I pass down along with it.

Reupholstering furniture was a trade Grandpa taught himself after he retired from the tire factory. (I still remember the rubber nubs, like tiny ants, that littered his shirt pockets from trimming tires). One piece of furniture I remember in particular was an antique settee he re-covered. The frame was of dark-stained wood–mahogany?–with intricate carvings. Grandpa used a russet-colored fabric for the seat and back. I thought it was the most exquisite piece of furniture I’d ever seen, and Grandpa had worked magic to make it look so expensive.

This was well before YouTube. I can still picture the how-to books in his workroom, with patterns, graphs, and color photos of finished samples. A couple walls were lined with pegboards and tools; one of my favorite items was this wooden wheel with baby food jars attached to it. He’d nailed the lids around the wheel’s circumference, the jars screwed into them. They held screws, upholstery tacks, nails, etc., sorted by size and function. He’d spin the wheel to the jar he needed, and simply unscrew it from the lid and pick through until he found the right washer or button or whatever. It hung above the workbench within easy reach, keeping things handy and neat. I thought he was immensely clever, and I liked the sound of the items clinking as the wheel was turned.

My other Grandpa had a similar set-up in his basement for a different kind of work. At various times he’d delivered bread, hung wallpaper, and worked in the local liquor store, but what I remember was his small engine repair business. After he retired from the liquor store, he took a correspondence course–that day’s version of YouTube–and set up a workshop behind a screen in one-fourth of the basement. He had his peg boards, workbenches, and boxes and boxes of wire, springs, screws, oils, and assorted replacement parts. He had a steady business of fixing mowers and things, but what I remember most were the hair dryer motors from Bessie Burns’ Hair Salon. Bessie lived across the alley from my grandparents and had her own business in her home. Those hairdryers were the large ones with the dome helmets that covered a woman’s head and dried her perms and sets while she read magazines. Whenever one burned out or stopped heating like it should, it wound up across the alley in Grandpa’s basement.

It’s hard to find either of these businesses today.

My family has always been blue-collar. Besides my grandpas, both my grandmas retired from factories in town, and Dad worked as a tool and die maker all his work life. Mom had more professional jobs as an office manager for a couple doctors, as a DMV employee, and in customer service for a department store, but she also waited tables.

My sisters and I all started out working in food service, me at Taylor’s Sundae Shoppe, and both of them at Wendy’s. I ‘graduated’ to being a maid at The Breakers Hotel at Cedar Point, then to being the night cleaning lady at a factory. While some parts of those jobs were quite fun, I’ve also cleaned a lot of other people’s toilets, slopped a lot of mops, and hauled off a lot of other people’s trash. It was dirty, humbling, honorable work.

This past week while at my writers’ workshop, I talked with a friend who has her doctorate but, in her retirement, assembles cheese trays and packages at a wholesale food distributor and grocery store. She enjoys the work and her co-workers, but told me how it’s opened her eyes to the physical demands and financial shortcomings of those menial but necessary kinds of jobs; how some of her co-workers must work three of them in order to provide for their family.

Our annual workshop is held at Wildacres Retreat Center up in the mountains. We stay in lodges and part of our departure routine is stripping our beds and gathering our towels, then taking them to a central drop-off area where housekeeping staff gathers everything. They’ll dust, vacuum, and clean our bathrooms for the next group that’s waiting to arrive.

Last Sunday morning I stopped in Panera for breakfast. The woman ahead of me was one of those customers–dissatisfied and complaining about everything, all with huffs and eye rolling. The employee was a young girl who did a great job of staying courteous but was definitely shaken. When it was finally my turn, she greeted me but was still unsettled and looking at the screen ready to take my order. Before I gave it, I asked, ‘And how are you this morning?’ She looked up a bit startled, but then a big smile spread across her face, her eyes brightened, and she laughed answering, ‘I’m good. Thank you for asking.’

The exchange was a reminder of those times I’m that customer and forget to show appreciation.

On this Labor Day, may we celebrate the waitresses, cleaning people, grocery shelve stockers, small business owners, service people, healthcare workers, teachers, farmers … those who make our lives easier.

I hope your cookouts today are bountiful and delicious and you have a wonderful week! I’ll see you next Monday.