Not long ago my wife, daughter, and I were driving along M Street in Georgetown, just past Wisconsin Avenue, when my wife gestured in the direction of an ancient building on the south side of M Street, now an elegant boutique.
“Isn’t that where you had your first job?” she asked.
“Not my first job,” I answered, “but my first job after graduating from college.”
At this point my daughter was intrigued–all right, amused–by the idea that her father had once labored in a pricey dress shop. But in fact, the building had not always been a dress shop; and, as I explained as we drove out M Street toward Key Bridge, it’s an interesting story.
Interesting, and instructive, too. Thirty-four summers ago the building, which had been constructed around 1800, had been vacant for a quarter-century. It had once been home to whatever the Bureau of Indian Affairs was called during the Madison administration (or so I was told) and had served variously as federal offices, a brothel, and, between 1881 and 1947, a firehouse. There were two arched entrances, through which the hook-and-ladder had been driven, and a giant hole in the second floor where the pole had been.
One day, late in the spring of 1973, a former classmate of mine called and asked if I wanted to make a little money. I had just been awarded my bachelor’s degree, but had not yet begun laboring at the Reuters Washington bureau. I had already rented a small, slightly seedy, flat in the city and, indeed, could use an infusion of capital.
Sure, I replied.
A onetime employer of my friend had undertaken some grandiose (and ultimately ill-fated) project to establish a national firefighting museum, and had gotten a grant to lease the building. In the meantime, the old firehouse, which had been unoccupied for 26 years, had to be cleaned out. That was where my friend and I came in.
It had not occurred to me to ask what happens inside old buildings in 26 years. But the next morning, when we were presented with a shovel and breathing mask, I had a sudden inkling. In the course of two-and-a-half decades, the charming old Federal-era structure had become the repository of an untold quantity (usually knee-deep) of pigeon feces.
I don’t know whether my memory exaggerates, but I recall a particularly hot day. The second floor, which contained several rooms and a couple of short staircases, boasted a two-foot accumulation of dry, powdery stuff, augmented by stray feathers and bones. But the roof had developed a series of leaks over time, so the third floor featured a moist version of the substance, much heavier and more difficult to maneuver.
We were blessed in one respect. That giant hole where the firemen’s pole had been located allowed us to drop a huge cloth into a dumpster on the ground floor, so we merely had to push the stuff over the side of the hole and into the dumpster. This produced a cloud of ungodly (not to say disease-ridden) pigeon dust, which easily penetrated our modest protection.
The third floor was a different matter: Each shovelful had to be carefully transported down corridors and slippery steps before being pitched overboard. We had been joined that morning by a jolly hippie-type who regarded us with a mixture of condescension and pot-fueled amusement. His work ethic, shall we say, left something to be desired–there were innumerable cigarette breaks and mysterious absences–and by the time we graduated to the third floor, he was on permanent sabbatical. Too bad, I remember thinking; I would like to have emptied my shovel onto his fun-loving head.
In the fullness of time, I am happy to report, the job was completed, and I can still feel the joy with which we staggered out onto M Street a pair of free men. I admit that my pleasure was reduced a little when handed a check for the day’s effort–$18 in my memory, perhaps a bit more–and returning to my squalid apartment that evening I stood in the shower, just stood there and rinsed, for a very long time.
In recounting this seminal incident to my daughter, I tried to recall what lessons I learned that day. First, I was reminded of the dignity of labor: Work may not always be pleasurable, or very interesting, but done conscientiously is its own reward. Those 18 dollars were rightfully earned.
Second, I confirmed in my mind that manual labor was never my calling, and that working at a desk, and wearing a tie every day, suited me fine. After eight sweat-stained hours of immersion in pigeon byproducts, every subsequent job has seemed rather pleasant.
PHILIP TERZIAN
