My First Job

"Before my first job at the bank picking up cigarette butts outside and picking up trash in the bathrooms, I started out in high school as a handyman/janitor at St. Andrew Catholic Church in Cape Coral. I was a parishioner of the church and lived behind it, so I walked to work.

"Believe it or not, the guy who started there in 1965 is still doing the yard work. When we did yard work we reported to him, and he assigned us things to do. Someone else assigned the internal stuff-the things we didn't want to do-like cleaning toilets. We would've rather stayed outside.

"I remember when it got cold in the winters, we ran over to Circle K or we would bring leftovers and heat the food on the manifolds on our [car] engines.

"It was a good experience; it allowed me to interact with a lot of people. Unfortunately, some people looked down on you-but the good ones made up for it, and I would encourage my own kids to do it.

"We earned minimum wage, about $2.65 an hour. It wasn't much more when I started at the bank. I worked [at St. Andrew] all through high school. When I was a senior, I graduated early. I was going to Edison College and I thought, 'Well, I need money.' So I decided to look and see what was available. [The bank] wanted to hire me, but I was too young to have a cash drawer. So I started out as a janitor. For a young guy, it was a humbling experience. It's hard to brag, 'Hey, I'm the janitor.' People looked at you as a janitor and not as a person.

"Today, everybody we talk to here-it doesn't matter who they are-we try to look them in the eye and treat them like everyone else."

-Interview by Katie S. Betz