IT WOULDN'T BE CHRISTMAS WITHOUT A SHIFT!
Scrooge wasn’t the only boss who expected people to work Christmas Day or else – though he might have been the meanest. When Charles Dickens wrote “A Christmas Carol,” the round-the-clock business of the Industrial Revolution had begun, and the workers’ movements that led to paid holidays and decent conditions were still far in the future.
Poor Bob Cratchit was the extreme case, but plenty of people, in factories, docks, and town houses, would have been working on that Victorian Christmas Day.
Even before our Covid-influenced 24/7 cycle of email and work from home, there were always jobs that had to be done each day, every day. Servants, for example, had to get their “betters” homes clean and their fancy dinner cooked and laid out. They might get a half day and a small gift from the mistress if they were lucky.
As social conditions improved, and more people took – and expected – time off, the idea of working holidays became unusual, or actively bad.
Still, though, some places simply can’t shut down for the holidays: police and fire stations, hospitals – and newsrooms.
Some people even choose to work the holidays for any number of good reasons.
Many of my Jewish colleagues offer to work Christmas Eve and Christmas Day so our Christian friends can be with their families. It happens a lot, at least in radio – the owner of a Vermont station where I worked was Jewish, and he had the engineer teach him the bare minimum he needed to know to stay on the air so his employees could be free for the day.
Holiday work can also be part of a larger picture. I’m not the only mother who chooses to work weekends and holidays so I can be home at the end of the school day.
Working holidays is really just part of the deal in many industries – and especially broadcasting. Early in your career, you’re taking those shifts as a foothold at a better station…later you’re scoring an occasional shift just to stay in the game.
At least for us, it can be a good thing. Some of my favorite holiday moments have been in newsrooms, especially Christmases with the 1010 WINS team. We’ve become a “work family.” Even though I was technically home for Christmas in 2020 because we were working remotely, it didn’t feel like home – or a holiday -- without the gang. Special shout-out here to Jon Belmont, living treasure anchor, king of the headline, and master of gallows humor, who worked every Christmas for decades. Still miss you.
Honestly, holidays are just fun to work. The bosses are out of the building, the mood is looser and more fun, and inevitably, things happen.
Say, the year I worked a double shift at the tiny radio station in my Western PA hometown. We were running all-Christmas music on reel-to-reel tapes -- yes, this was a very long time ago! The tenth or twelfth time I heard “Happy Christmas, War is Over,” I realized something.
John, Yoko, and the kids weren’t singing what I thought they were.
Country girl that I am, I’d thought the lyric was:
“It wouldn’t be Christmas without any beer.”
Whatever your holiday brings, may it be safe, happy and full of joy!
Got a #ThrowbackThursday idea? Drop it in the comments!
Poor Bob Cratchit was the extreme case, but plenty of people, in factories, docks, and town houses, would have been working on that Victorian Christmas Day.
Even before our Covid-influenced 24/7 cycle of email and work from home, there were always jobs that had to be done each day, every day. Servants, for example, had to get their “betters” homes clean and their fancy dinner cooked and laid out. They might get a half day and a small gift from the mistress if they were lucky.
As social conditions improved, and more people took – and expected – time off, the idea of working holidays became unusual, or actively bad.
Still, though, some places simply can’t shut down for the holidays: police and fire stations, hospitals – and newsrooms.
Some people even choose to work the holidays for any number of good reasons.
Many of my Jewish colleagues offer to work Christmas Eve and Christmas Day so our Christian friends can be with their families. It happens a lot, at least in radio – the owner of a Vermont station where I worked was Jewish, and he had the engineer teach him the bare minimum he needed to know to stay on the air so his employees could be free for the day.
Holiday work can also be part of a larger picture. I’m not the only mother who chooses to work weekends and holidays so I can be home at the end of the school day.
Working holidays is really just part of the deal in many industries – and especially broadcasting. Early in your career, you’re taking those shifts as a foothold at a better station…later you’re scoring an occasional shift just to stay in the game.
At least for us, it can be a good thing. Some of my favorite holiday moments have been in newsrooms, especially Christmases with the 1010 WINS team. We’ve become a “work family.” Even though I was technically home for Christmas in 2020 because we were working remotely, it didn’t feel like home – or a holiday -- without the gang. Special shout-out here to Jon Belmont, living treasure anchor, king of the headline, and master of gallows humor, who worked every Christmas for decades. Still miss you.
Honestly, holidays are just fun to work. The bosses are out of the building, the mood is looser and more fun, and inevitably, things happen.
Say, the year I worked a double shift at the tiny radio station in my Western PA hometown. We were running all-Christmas music on reel-to-reel tapes -- yes, this was a very long time ago! The tenth or twelfth time I heard “Happy Christmas, War is Over,” I realized something.
John, Yoko, and the kids weren’t singing what I thought they were.
Country girl that I am, I’d thought the lyric was:
“It wouldn’t be Christmas without any beer.”
Whatever your holiday brings, may it be safe, happy and full of joy!
Got a #ThrowbackThursday idea? Drop it in the comments!
No comments have been added yet.
