Being a teenager is expensive. There are bills to pay, food to eat, places to hang, and a future to save for. Most of us are getting to that age where we are finding jobs (and some of us already have jobs!) to help pay for the things we need. I work in food service at the Columbia Mall and my feelings about it are complicated.

At first, my job didn’t seem so bad when I started during junior year. Throughout the first few months, I started to realize what other people meant when they would mention how it feels to have a food service job. Sometimes there’s just not quite enough work to go around. Customers often come in waves, so when there is downtime with no customers, it can get a bit boring just standing around. 

One thing that happens is when the schedule is made up at least a month and a half ahead of time. This causes the workers to not have time to request off, and when we do need that time off, it always seems like it’s a problem. Some things are said that shouldn’t be said, such as, “Maybe you should’ve requested off earlier.” That’s not a fair thing to say to people because things come up in people’s lives and we need those days off. 

It was stressful dealing with a job and school during my junior year, but having my own money was nice, so I just dealt with the busy schedule. I would tell myself I wouldn’t do certain things at this job because they didn’t pay me enough, but me being me, I wasn’t that type of person, so I still did it anyway. 

Now that I’m in my senior year, we have more freedom at school such as early release options. This means that I can pick up earlier shifts or even work more days than I was able to last year. 

There are also things I like about my job. For example, all the co-workers there are cool (even though they may sometimes think they’re in charge), but they aren’t that bad. In my workplace, we stand up for each other like when customers catch attitudes with us and think they are right. They think asking for our manager is going to mean that the manager will take their side, just for them to hear our manager say the same thing we had just told them. We have our joking times and we have our serious times, but overall I like most of my coworkers. 

Having a job is not bad whether it’s retail, food service, or whatever else you can find as a teenager. There will be times when you will have good experiences and will most likely have times when it won’t be the experience you wished for. But having a job is an important experience for us at this point in our lives. I’ve learned how to manage my time, get along with others, act polite when I don’t feel like acting polite, and experience the joy of financial freedom.