Looking back on a lifetime of (very different) jobs | Tell Your Story

I ran into a friend at S & S that I haven’t talked to in years. She asked me what I doing now and I told her I am retired and trying my best to do nothing. She asked what I retired from and I told her I was a real estate appraiser. But as we talked I realized that was not the only job I had and at 74 years old I have had lots of jobs. Some really good and some really awful.

My first job was when I was 15. I babysat kids at a Santa Fe Railroad summer convention at $1.65 an hour. When I was 18 I got a job at the May Co. Depart. store in Arcadia. In 1972 I moved up to Chico to go to college and got a job at the Royal Crown Bottling Co. I sat behind the bottle washing machine and watched 16 bottles come out and go down the line. Boring.

I picked cucumbers in Corning. Awful. I cleaned houses. In 1975 I had an opportunity to go out and fight forest fires with the Fire Breakers, an ad hoc fire crew. I then worked my way out of the line crew to be a swamper for a faller on fires. There were no females crazy enough to do that back then. I started with Bob Seals of Klean Kanteen. He was a little out there but boy did he know how to deal with trees and fires with his big old Sthil saw with a 60” bar. I loved it. I loved fire camp, helicopters, big trees on fire and the whole scene around that job. But when fire season ended, I got a job at Continental Nut Co. sorting almonds that came out of the blanching machine. Boring. Really boring. 3:00 to 11:00. School in the morning and nuts at night.

I graduated with a degree in Parks and Resources and then got the best job of my life. I was the Wild River Patrol Person for Plumas National Forest on the Middle Fork of the Feather River. The first year I did it on horseback. The next two years I did it with a girl friend that worked for the forest service during my fire fighting days. They dropped us off at a trail head and came back and got us 10 days later. From June to September. I got paid to live out in the mountains. I hiked the south side of the Middle Fork River from Oroville to Quincy. We didn’t have a tent. The nights with no moon were really really dark. I made an entire quilt with the only light of a camp fire. I hiked the most beautiful country in the world. I absolutely loved that job but when Ronald Reagan did the big budget cut we lost the program.

I went to the EDD when it was over and got a job at a civil engineering company that was putting in logging roads. Monday through Friday in the mountains. I did this for two seasons. Working when it is cold and windy is brutal. I learned to chew red man. They gave me some thinking it might make me sick but I ended up asking for theirs so much they ended up giving me my own pack every Monday. I ended up continuing to work in town for them through 2 pregnancies. My husband at that time was an electrical contractor so I started helping him wire new construction. I ran a hole hog and pulled lots of wire. I got my license to clean new construction so I also cleaned a lot of the new homes being built in Chico. I remember cleaning all the windows in a home in the Big Chico Creek Estates with a 40-pound kid in a backpack on my back.

I saw an ad for part time cafeteria help for CUSD. I thought great, two or three hours a day and both my kids are in school. I started working in the Marigold cafeteria and worked my way up to being the head cook at Bidwell Jr. High. I made and turkey gravy for 1,000 kids. The joke is I can cook for 1,000 but I am a failure when it comes to a few. I really liked my job and everyone I worked with.

But when a looming divorce was in view I realized I need to do something to make more money. And fast. So a friend of mine said I should look into being a real estate appraiser. I took the classes and passed the test. It took me two years to get thru the trainee part but I made it and passed the licensing test in 2003. I retired from the school district in 2017 and then appraised real estate full time. Another job I totally loved. I got to see the best of the best and the worst of the worst.

I finally decided in 2022 that I have worked enough and wanted to be less responsible. Or not responsible. Irresponsible. Nonresponsible. Whatever. After 57 years of working, that’s enough. My only responsibility now is walking dogs at the Chico Animal Shelter, playing with grandkids and staying ahead of weeds in the yard.

When I was young I thought that you went to college and got a job that you would do for the rest of you life. Thank goodness that is not true or I would still be sitting behind a bottle washing machine. I would not have learned how to chew red man. I wouldn’t have seen a beautiful trout jumping out of the Feather River or the night sky when it is so dark outside that you couldn’t see your hand in front of your face. All these jobs made me what I am now. Except now I get to be lazy and do whatever I want!

Marla Stratton can be reached at marla.stratton@gmail.com.