Family and work

Class questions: Who am I as I go out the door? Who are my parents/friends/boyfriend?

Interestingly, the two are inherently connected. Even though we think of ourselves as very much individuals.

I spent this past summer doing a newspaper internship at The Oregonian, a 250,000+ circulation paper in Portland. On one of my last days there, I had an absolutely amazing conversation with Tom Hallman Jr., an absolutely amazing narrative reporter.

One of the things that struck me was how he started, in a sense, interviewing me right off the bat. He believes, correctly, that we view the world through our experiences, our parents' histories and what they do.

My dad has held many jobs since he arrived in New York in the '70s. He was a busboy at a restaurant for some time. Then he drove a yellow taxi for a long while. His experiences are fascinating. I can tell him a random address in the city -- "Can you pick me up in the city? I don't know where... Um. 1633 Broadway." And he knows right off the top of his head that it's at 50th Street and Broadway.

For a long time now, he has been a doorman at a building in Queens. Inherently fascinating job, sociologically. There's actually a book by a Columbia sociology professor all about doormen in the city. It's also a union job. Which is awesome. For us.

When I was little, my mom used to clean rich people's apartments in the city. I never really understood this back then. I knew she went to people's houses for work but it just never really crossed my mind to wonder. Or to really realize that my mother was cleaning other people's houses. Even though she went to high school right here in Queens, she couldn't go to college after high school because her papers had expired.

She finally got to go to college after getting her citizenship. She earned a two year degree in four years by working during the day and taking classes at night. Sometimes after dinner my dad, my sister and I would walk through the darkened parking lot toward the mall to surprise her at the train station. She's an occupational therapy assistant at a nursing home now, making a good living. And I guess that's how my family avoided the pink collar.

-- Carolina Hidalgo