THIS IS THE TIME EACH YEAR TO HAND OUT GRADUATION CARDS AND SAGE ADVICE THAT WILL IGNORED IN GENERAL. I have wondered occasionally what my life would have been like if I had been born earlier. What would have my job been? In my high school, seniors were required to take tests of dexterity and other skill evaluations. My school counselor broke the news bluntly to me. “Your manual dexterity and language skills are poor; my advice is don’t become a mechanic at a dealership and don’t attempt to write a great American novel.” I wound up spending 47 years in dealerships. I think my counselor changed careers. Maybe she went into writing novels. I did sell truck parts and not turn wrenches. She was spot on about not writing fiction. All you new graduates out there, take heart! Limitations are not roadblocks to success, just something to work around! Sage advice to be sadly ignored. Here are some of the interesting job possibilities you WON’T have to apply for today. The LAMPLIGHTER was a guy with a ladder and went around city streets lighting gas or oil burning street lights. He would make one round in the late afternoon to light all of them and at dawn the next day, extinguishing them all. A bit on the repetitive side, but you could say he had a BRIGHT FUTURE. How about a LEECH COLLECTOR? Before much was known about the nature of blood diseases and high blood pressure, doctors would ‘cure’ a load of problems by controlled blood letting or attaching leeches to suck the ‘excess’ blood. Actually, later on, we did find a few ailments where leech saliva does help. It seems the icky things have a substance that treats hypertension we can’t yet synthesize. Personally, I find VAMPIRES MORE APPEALING than leeches. I don’t think even my old counselor could write a bestselling novel on a LEECH. Some professions never go away. An ABACTOR is a cattle thief. A GRANGER is a farmer. A KNELLER is a chimney sweep. Don’t confuse that with a KNOLLER, who was a bell ringer. A HUCKSTER is a street peddler. A BIDDIE was just a female servant. I am sure the male servants gossiped below-stairs just as much, but the OLD BIDDIE got the poor press. An OWLER was a wool smuggler at a time in England when wool exports were banned. Sounds like the beginning to a bad sheep joke on a Cheyenne street corner. A BATMAN was the personal assistant of an English officer. I don’t think the profession had anything to do with the American comic hero. Although Alfred, the butler might qualify as a BATMAN. Lastly, a BLUESTOCKING WAS A FEMALE WRITER. It was never clarified what she wrote. Maybe we could ask NIKI?
By ED PECK
Special to the Herald Times
