By Jill Orluskie
Thanks to my father, I couldn’t have asked for a better summer job on Martha’s Vineyard from 1982 to 1985. Although my father’s job at Bell Atlantic had him work on the Island only for the summers, I got the real deal of being a kid on Island time. That was my job — to be a kid – and I took the role seriously, just as my dad did with his technician job. Sometimes my dad would take me to the Vineyard Haven office. Entering the office, I would hear all kinds of clickety-clacks throughout the whole building from all the gadgets and wires around. My dad would go in a drawer to get the dog bones out for the dogs who visited often and must’ve lived down the road — one old Golden Retriever and one silly black Lab waited for their handful of multicolor mini Milk-Bones from the box. If this was part of my dad’s job, sign me up!
It was a gypsy’s life, traveling to the Vineyard, not knowing where we were going to live — what town was anybody’s guess. What type of accommodations? How long? Will there be another summer strike like we had last year?
One summer we lived in Hidden Cove, where my job was to take the stale food out of the drawer and feed the mallard ducks and guinea hens under our deck two floors down from us. The ducks mostly got hot dog buns and Cape Cod potato chips. I’d crumple and grind the bread and chips up like a secret recipe, and they ate every morsel.
The next summer, we stayed at Causeway apartments. This is where I learned how to play hide-and-go-seek. The most important rule in the game: our home base was the large clunky soda machine located next to the laundry room on the other side of the apartments. We were marked safe as long as we were holding onto that soda machine where you could purchase a Tab, 7-UP, grape or orange Crush, or Five Alive.
We must’ve had slim pickings the following summer, because we stayed somewhere, or a few places, in Tisbury that are now a blur to us. One of the places we were at for a short period reeked of mothballs and had louder-than-life crickets. My brothers and I slept in our big brown Brady Bunch station wagon a few nights. Between the mothball stench and the chirping crickets, our station wagon was a luxury.
Another kid duty was attending the Flying Horses. I would get all gussied up in my white button-down shirt with the pastel stripes and built-in bow-tie purchased from Bradlees. I wore it to impress the boy working on the carousel. He looked just like John Oates from Hall & Oates.
No matter the town or where I stayed, I certainly made the most of it. And the places I mention still exist today. Going to the Candy Bazaar and Cannon Park was top tier. The job responsibilities I had being a summer kiddo was not a hard role to fill between the beach days, strolling into Bunch of Grapes Bookstore, and hitting at least one library a day.
Really enjoyed My Job Was To Be a Kid!!
Thank you
I really enjoyed this coming of age Essay by Jill Oluskie. It brings back the innocence of childhood. Thank you, Jill
I loved My Job Was to Be a Kid!! That same joie de vivre still exists in this author! I have had the pleasure of knowing her…as her bus driver…for 15 years. She is every bit the interested and interesting character depicted in her essay. It is an honor to know her.
Jim McGonigle. .. Harwich Port. CCRTA
Thank you for the compliments and feedback. This was truly a highlight of my childhood living here for a few summers.
Thank you, Jane. I hope you have experienced some highlights similar going to the Vineyard.
Thank you, Peggy! I hope your Grub Street classes are going well and I know you are coming to the end of this journey. Bigger and better ahead, dear!
Thank you, Jimbo! We’ve come a long way baby. As you well know, you and I could easily write and publish a few stories and of course submit a few photos included but not limited to red shoes, guys wearing pompadores and the infamous smoothing of the pizza in the plush seating. 🙂
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