Workers. Toilers. Pluggers. Dogsbodies.
Who are the people who make, do, fix, feed, and build?
Backstory
During the last pandemic, a rift exploded in the small town where I live and work. It took the xenophobic fear of the pandemic and erupted into the public square in the shape of anger, and sometimes hate, directed at the businesses and employees who make them all go around. We spent a considerable amount of time reminding neighbors that it was their own neighbors behind all those shop doors.
I think people have stopped thinking about how work gets done. It just gets done.
I started to think about how many times I’ve hauled myself up off the floor, and it seemed that then again, the regular working people who make things, fix things, cook things- that we were going to have to save this place one more time.
The Trips
In the first of many trips taken across the small roads and “Main Streets” of this country, looking for the the people who do- I met: python hunters, cooks, oyster shuckers, fruit sellers, a mermaid, a lionfish huntress and more.
Since then, I have tried to meet as many people as I can, learn their stories if possible and, of course, take a photo.
The Python Removal Agent
I’ll always regret that I didn’t photograph the python hunters. I wasn’t thinking like that yet.
We were camped in a small park near Cedar Key, Florida, along the Gulf of Mexico. A young family was at a site not far from us. The couple had been howlin at the moon all night and in the early hours, our coffee pot must have raised the man right out of his picnic-tabletop slumber.
He came over, introduced himself and inquired as to how long we’d be on the road and other niceties of the new nomad. As the currency of this group goes- he offered some insight into where a man might make a couple of bucks.
Florida has a python problem. To put a finer point on it- pythons as pets aren’t for everyone and many have been dumped into the Everglades as gator food. Except they are an apex predator. And they reproduce fast than they can eat bunnies.
As I was working my way through a camp coffee, I was being schooled in opportunity by a man wearing just a leather cowboy hat, and jeans.
They had driven all the way down from Michigan in search of this work, and he had found some success stalking pythons in the Everglades at night. The deal is that Florida has put a bounty on pythons and will pay you a few hundred dollars per snake- more if they are really big! They’ll even pay you minimum wage while you look. Hunting consists mostly of walking along gator-infested canals, at night, looking for 10-foot or better Burmese Pythons and, if this gent’s style is to be the benchmark- yell “git him” to your ten-year-old hunting partner.
You can register to become a Python Removal Agent at:
Bike-Based Logistics Engineer
Amazon has leveraged the near infinite resource of the NYC need to hustle. Throughout the city you will find dozens of cargo bike messengers standing by to drain an Amazon tractor-trailer and set off in every direction to finish the ‘last mile’. These are largely paid as independent contractors, without workers comp or disability and are the underpinnings to the billion-dollar business. The bikes are purchased by the rider and can be upwards of $4000.
The Paletta Mobile Retailer
I heard the paletta cart first. An irregular clanging and a bright bell.
She was small but strong, dragging the cart full of frozen treats through the deep sand of Brighton Beach in New York City.
A Russian man working on a professional-grade tan watched her struggle, in casual amusement while puffing away on his cigar.
The Street Market
During any given day, the sidewalks of New York’s Chinatown experience a build/breakdown cycle that is one of the most dynamic piece of entrepreneurial choreography.
Every morning, full market stalls are built and filled. Hardware, luggage, pets, fish, flowers, kitchen utensils.
Fishmongers push their storefronts out into the world. Crabs try to scuttle out of their bins. Fish totes on the sidewalk with catches brought in from the big markets and black-market fishermen.
At the end of the day, the whole process rewinds, complete storefronts are stripped and put away. The temporary street stalls vanished into minivans and trucks until tomorrow. The shear effort just to build and break it all.
Some thoughts on food
I continue to be amazed by the absolute army that exists today responsible for making food for other people. When you add in the people who grow the food, pack, ship, truck the food- it is staggering.
From owners down to night porters- there is not a shortage of amazing stories. And as we face a new era of anti-immigrant rhetoric, I think about how food in America is the story of immigration and that generations have lifted themselves through this industry to make bigger lives for their next generations.
I have been lucky to work alongside so many. It is my honor and privilege.
And I cry for their fears today.
The Balloon Man
I stare at this photo often. Maybe because he stares back.
It was late, I blew focus with a little camera shake at low shutter speed. But to me, this is an inciting moment.
This man, this place, this job. All the people living their best life, buying a balloon to celebrate a festival. The difficulty and challenge of his late day.
Mad respect for the Balloon Man.
This is such a great post, interesting insight, and wonderful pictures.
Great post (and so timely and important).