A feel good moment

[viperess]

I believe in having a good time at work and sound like I joke around allot but I take it and the people I work with very serious.

Day before yesterday was interview day and I had about six or seven lined up. One of several were a 15 so his grandmother was with him.I did the drug test and I told him he needed a work permit and to get the application at the labor department. Nice young kid...
The next day he brings me the application and as I look over it I hear him say...'I sure hope I get this job'... I tell him he already has the job, and once the drug test comes back and the permit is here he can work. Looking at him I see concern. Here is what I discovered in the next ten minutes.

15 years old and this job will help his pregnant girlfriend....
Somewhere in the last month he did 'something with my friends...I don't know what it was'...
His grandmother and mother know nothing of the drugs.
After what really amounted to counseling I explain that it would 'take a while...maybe over a week to get the permit and we would have to redo the drug test'.

A young kid who fucked up and is trying to make it right. If I were to send in the drug test now it would black ball him applying at any location for a year and jobs for kids that young are few and far between.
I gave him a loving scold, and said being a dad meant responsibility now not later. You could tell he'd heard that before. When all was said and done and we were leaving the office he wrapped both arms around me and hugged me for quite some time. When he backed up he had tears in his eyes. The other manager that was in the office with us had this huge smile on his face too.
That one moment made me think my career is worth it after all.
The trouble I could get into for this is unlimited, but would I have been better by ratting the kid out and making a bad situation a hell of a lot worse?
I feel good about what I did.

[edie2u]

Good for you! You have a good heart and this seems to be rare in this day and age!

[Christinko]

DeeDee, you are a sweetie, to be sure!

And I agree--we each have probably needed someone to come through for us in the face of adversity or our own stupidness.

I remember my mother kindly helping to hold my head over the toilet when I puked up gin while in high school and then putting me to bed and explaining about putting my foot on the floor to stop the spins. She never said another word about it, and I never came home drunk again.

If the kid makes good on the chance you gave him, then you were likely that catalyst that may have changed his whole life.

I must admit, the dark side of me says if he fucks up again he needs to receive whatever punishments life metes out until he has an ah, ha! moment and makes ch-ch-changes that he needs to make in his choices.