Psychology

How to Value The Fruits of Your Labor

Female workers in a rubber factory in Lancashire, September 1918; by George P. Lewis

I grew up with a lot of stories about work.

I hung out in garages, airports, and hotels while my parents ran their rent-a-car business and learned how to deal with irate customers, flat tires, and accidents.

I listened to stories about my 8th-grade educated grandfather, a hayseed from Tennessee, who worked his way up from Wall Street messenger boy to owning a seat on the New York Stock Exchange.

I have the brass token (“bango”) that my grandparents, indentured plantation workers, presented every payday. Eventually, they bought out their contract and raised pigs. The bango became the keychain for the key to the Quonset hut I grew up in.

Bango by Mariko Gordon

I watched my grandmother work well into her 90s, tending her anthuriums in the morning and sewing quilts from aloha shirt scraps in the afternoon. She was always busy but never in a hurry and found time to pray twice a day, take naps, watch sumo wrestling, and listen to Okinawan music.

After a lifetime of backbreaking work, she struck a nice balance.