Work

Sometimes I feel like my job is really rewarding.  Like when I spend a shift helping A look for places he can apply for a job and then teach him how to make lasagna. 

Sometimes I feel like my job is a waste because I have shifts where all I do is play video games for hours on end with T or watch G as he hangs out with a girl.

And sometimes I come home wanting to shower right away and never touch anything in the house again until I have disinfected it.  Like yesterday when T wanted me to help him make Hamburger Helper and he tried to open the ground beef package with his mouth and then touched it with his hands and proceeded to touch everything with his raw meat hands including wiping his hands on his clothes.  Or when I notice that one of the guys use the bathroom and don't wash their hands afterward.  It makes me want to show them a video on infectious diseases to drive home the importance of cleanliness.  I figured making a huge deal right away about the meat thing would just annoy or freak T out.  Instead I told him that we need to wash our hands right after touching raw meat so that we don't get sick.

My job makes me so much more aware of everything.  Even what I'm watching on tv.  Movies and tv can not have any type of nudity or sensual situation.  No young children (at what age are children no longer young?).  No gangs.  No adult humor like Family Guy.  Yesterday I was watching Criminal Minds while A and T were playing video games and while I watched G hang out with a girl.  It was fine until I started cleaning the kitchen once the next staff member got there and a new episode started that was about sex offenders.  It kept talking about sex crimes and I raced to change it before the guys could hear.  Cop shows?  Be careful.

I'm starting to feel like a germaphobe.  I think about how dirty the Wii controllers are before I touch them.  Same with the door handle on the bathroom door.  I wash my hands after touching just about anything.  I bring and use my own hand sanitizer. 

Last week I went on the weekly grocery shopping trip.  I went around with G specifically.  As I fretted about the amount of liquids he was buying and what he was actually going to eat during the week he was super patient with me every time my cell phone calculator erased everything and we would have to go back to check prices.  He asked me what was going on in my life and what I had been doing earlier in the day.  Yesterday I watched him as he insisted on walking on the street side of the sidewalk next to his female friend.  I see the good in these guys.  It can be frustrating spending an afternoon with someone fake passing out but then when you see them learn and develop and overcome negative behaviors...  sometimes I want to cry on my walk home because I feel so good about what I've done that day.