WEEKJOB: SKI-RESORT STAFF
LOCATION: LAKE LOUISE, ALBERTA
IT WAS A “work hard, play hard, party even harder” mentality at the resort. I did my best to keep up, though, as it was the end of April, the season was complete, so most employees boasted six months of practice.
Throughout the week I worked in different departments: trail crew, lift attendants, snow-school instructors, and with the events team to help run the spring wrap-up event for the season. The event featured a full lineup of free concerts, demos, biketrial riders, and a bunch of other activities. There was even a hot-dog-eating contest. I considered signing up but in the end decided that stuffing my face with whole hot dogs, drool pouring out of my mouth, forcing back the gag reflex, and then secretly vomiting under the table out of the view of the audience wasn’t something I felt inclined to experience. It was fun to watch though.
It was the first one-week job where I tried out different departments within the same company. It gave me a unique perspective. There are more than six hundred employees at Lake Louise, and I got to see how much work and organizing goes into effectively operating such a large company.
I never thought I’d enjoy working for a large company. I assumed that it would be difficult to develop a sense of teamwork and to see how I was contributing to the company’s overall success. But each department I worked with was made up of smaller teams, and each team had its own unique culture within the context of the larger company. This seemed to help things run smoothly and made all employees feel like they play an important role.
On Wednesday I was in the cafeteria at the base of the mountain when I overheard a conversation between a visitor and an employee. The employee, in her early twenties, was justifying her minimum-wage seasonal job. The visitor didn’t appear to be passing judgment, but the employee still played down her current situation, as if to convey her awareness that she should be doing something more significant. She seemed to want him to know not to judge her based on her current job, because she had a plan.
I heard several similar conversations throughout the week. The majority of the employees loved their jobs. They worked at one of the most spectacular mountain resorts in Canada, where they got a free season pass and could hit the mountain at every opportunity. To sweeten the deal, there were always festivals and events coming through town. Yet still many seemed to feel guilty for putting off the “real job” route (or to at least feel enough external pressure to give this façade to an outside observer).
For as long as I could remember, I’d always entered social gatherings ready to report on “my plan”—ensuring that I’d communicate a desire to get ahead and an awareness that I could do better. For some reason it never seemed acceptable to be content with my current situation. I’d always assumed that other young people knew how they were supposed to spend their time after college—that I was the only one struggling to figure it out. They’d state their plans with conviction and confidence almost as if rehearsed. When I was among them, I did it too. We’d validate one another’s plans and then carry on with another day. When I was busy, I didn’t question this. But when things were quiet, part of me wondered if it was all a show—were we trying to convince others as much as ourselves? Lately, I’d begun to suspect that the majority of young people were just like me—simply making it up as they went along.