After-school job more than just a paycheck

As I was paying for my groceries recently at the supermarket, the young cashier had trouble figuring out my change. She explained that she didn't really know math.

"You should have been around when I was a cashier," I said. "We had to punch in the price of every item - no bar codes. And we had to calculate the sales tax in our heads."

Still, I told her, that high school job in my hometown grocery store was the best job I've ever had.

I wasn't kidding. That first away-from-the-farm job was the perfect starting point for a life of work. It gave me a lot more than those precious paychecks (a whopping $1.19 for every hour I put in). It was a well-rounded education, teaching me about responsibility, finances and people.

I began at the bottom, bagging groceries after school and all day on Saturdays. I learned the value of a necktie as a uniform. My white apron had to be neat and clean. I represented that store, and so I had to meet certain standards.

My fellow high schoolers and I knew that our jobs depended on being prompt, efficient and honest. We were friendly with customers, but we dared not let them hear us complain about our jobs or talk about last night's date. (I wish stores still had that policy.)

Shoppers never had to carry their own groceries, whether it was one bag or a week's supply; that's what we were there for. Of course, it was always an easier job if the shoppers had a teenage daughter in tow or a muscle car that we could ogle as we deposited bags into the back seat.

We were not allowed to take tips (that paycheck was our compensation) unless refusing would offend the customer. There were other rewards better than money, though, such as stories we heard from senior citizens as we walked them around the corner to a nearby housing project.

We had other duties, too: unloading tractor-trailers of canned goods, frozen food and fresh vegetables; preparing the produce; helping out in the meat market; sweeping and mopping the floor every night at closing time.

We rounded up the shopping carts in the parking lot at night and took them inside. We burned empty cardboard boxes in a gigantic incinerator. We sorted empty soft-drink bottles that customers had returned for a refund.

I learned to stock shelves, order inventory and operate the cash register.

It was all hard work, but soon I learned the price of everything, and even more important, the value. I grew to take pride in a well-stocked shelf and a solidly packed paper sack of groceries (no plastic in my day). I was amazed that my fingers, which hadn't mastered high school typing class, could dart across the clunky cash register without waiting for my brain to catch up.

Good or bad, everything was a learning experience. One busy Saturday evening, I rang up a buggy full of groceries for a woman. She thought the total was too high and let everyone know it.

There was only one thing to do: We unbagged everything, and I rang it all up again. This time, the total was 5 cents lower. She gloated as I refunded her nickel.

As she left, I saw her child eating a 5-cent candy bar that I had counted the first time but not the second because she had handed it to him to stop his crying. I didn't bother telling her where the discrepancy lay; back then, the customer was always right.

That first job got me through high school and even into college. Today I still have a tender place in my heart for grocery stores. Whenever I encounter a store employee who treats me the way we treated our own customers, I know someone has learned more than just a job.

Reach Glynn Moore at (706) 823-3419 or glynn.moore@augustachronicle.com.