Who Are the People In Your Neighborhood

I am old enough to have been amongst the first preschoolers to see Sesame Street. And while the show is still great, I've got to point out that it is no where as cool as that first incarnation. It had a groovy, authentic, late 60's, power-to-the people, urban vibe. And Gordon was a hip, skinny guy who looked something like Sly from the Family Stone (sans platform boots).

Back then the show offered cartoons in Spanish, the rockin muppet Roosevelt Franklin ("Yeah, yeah, yeah!"), the English neighbor from the Jefferson's who painted numbers randomly on stuff, and the guy who announced a pile of desserts only to slip down a flight of stairs and crash, ending in a whip-cream-covered heap. Pure gold to any four year old.

Another thing they did back then that has since gone the way of the dinosaur was a song that went, "Who are the people in your neighborhood?" Each time, they would go on to sing about a different profession, pointing out what each contributed to the community, inviting kids to imagine what it might be like to do that job.

Well, apparently it had an effect on me because it is something I am still interested in to this day. And I've found that people, even strangers, are often eager to respond to, "Tell me about what you do." So, here is a reocurring spot to share these conversations in an effort to try on a different profession for a little while. Maybe even thank God we picked the job we did.

#1: Obstetrician
When I was fifteen, I was a stock girl in a women's clothing store. The job was a tedious waste of my Saturdays for sure, but what made me quit was the ever-repeating loop of music. I had the misfortune of holding the job when "Ebony and Ivory" was all the rage -- and I heard it every forty-five minutes. I couldn't hack it. Little did I know this was the first sign that I was ill-suited to becoming an obstetrician.

Music is important to me, so when I was figuring what I might need in order to successfully give birth to a human child my thoughts went immediately to the power of truly motivational tunes. My husband had a hard time with the regular coach-as-breath-instructor-bit, but came through magnificently as DJ. During both of my labors nurses asked, "What are we listeing to?": Jeff Buckley, Aretha Franklin, U2 --and, in the case of the drug-free transition stage, only the Velvet Underground's 1969 would do. Then, right after my first son was born, the obstetrician told me that he was the first baby she had ever delivered to the Beatles (Revolver, to be specific). I asked what women usually listened to and she told me, with a sober expression: Enya.

Enya! Shit. When I think of taking on that profession, I think of blood and screaming, tears, long hours, the god-like heroics that would make anyone's head spin. But no. Come to find that you go through countless years of training waiting to be the hands through which human life enters the world and you end up putting up with mind-numbingly repetitive new age crap like Enya. No way. Hands of life or not, you couldn't pay me enough.