R is for Rose Grower

I had a collection of jobs in my youth and a few had something to do with flowers. As a 14-year-old, I spent weekends sitting behind a row of white plastic buckets full of a variety of flower arrangements. In some ways it was a pretty easy job that involved a good deal of sitting outside. The difficulties arose when the weather didn't cooperate.  Sitting outside all day is one thing but sitting outside in the rain all day with nothing more than a poncho makes for a crappy day at work.

Then there was the summer that I worked for a local rose grower. That position involved working for a family-owned company that grew red roses for florists in the Baltimore area. It wasn't my favorite summer job. First of all, I had to be at work at 7:00 pm- an extremely early hour for a college student. Secondly, I didn't work with anyone close to my age. There were three of us besides the owner that worked together. The one senior member had been there long enough to remember the owner when he was just a boy tagging along with his dad. The second lady was about 30- ancient as far as I was concerned.

There was a rhythm to a day among the roses. The morning meant time in the greenhouse with a heavy shirt that covered my arms, leather gloves, and a pair of clippers to snatch the budding roses off the bush at exactly the right time. Clipping too early meant they couldn't be sold to the local wholesalers. Clipping too late meant they were trash or gifts to take home. Roses held too long weren't a big problem but clipping too early meant a loss of money.

Once the roses were cut they were sorted by size and eventually wrapped up together in groups of 25. By 3:00 pm the cut for the day was packed and ready to head off to the wholesaler.

 It wasn't until the end of the summer that I found out I was close to being fired my first week- I lost a lot of money that week. "I didn't think you'd ever figure it out," my boss said with a smile.

The next summer I found myself a job that started later in the day.

Life Lesson: The perfect job is hard to find.