INTERNATIONAL CHILD AND YOUTH CARE NETWORK

14 AUGUST 2000
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Twelve years ago Mark Krueger reflected on the question of why he was a child and youth care worker. We could do that for ourselves today. And tomorrow we would probably come up with altogether different answers ...

Why do  I do it?

Have you ever thought about why you're a child and youth care worker? I've thought about it a lot over the last twenty years. I'm searching for clarity. Like a short story by Chekov I want everything about my work to be clear, crystal clear. Besides, people are always asking me.

I go through phases. Like when I first started I used to think it was my cause. Everyone needed a cause in those days. But after a while that seemed a little impersonal. So I figured I did it because it was fun. I mean where else could you play and get paid for it. The trouble with that line of reasoning though was that it wasn't always fun. There were days when it was work, hard, exhausting, gut-wrenching work and the pay was dirt.

Sometimes now I think I do it mostly because I understand kids. We seem to like the same things — a good rap, a little basketball, arts and crafts, camping, that kind of stuff. Being a bit of a rascal myself as a youth, I'm hip to where they're at. I can put myself in their shoes every once in a while. This never lasts very long though. Usually I start thinking, no I don't understand at all. There's no way I can relate to the horror some of them have been through.

So once in a while I might get on a developmental kick. I tell myself, face it, you're in the kid business because it gives you a chance to drag out your adolescence. E.B. White, my favorite essayist, said he always thought of himself as nineteen. I like that line of thinking. Some people say that people like us have authority and identity problems. Personally, I can't see anything wrong with it. I mean, did you ever know of anything more boring than someone who had it all together, people who know exactly what they want to be.

I can take the opposite approach too and get lofty about it. I'm in it because there is no other job that can help me grow as much. The kids and people in the field make me be honest with myself. They make me take a look inward, see what's going on, lick the authority problem. When I'm in this mood, I say things like, "I get much more out of it than I put into it." This is a "touchy feely" phase, no doubt about it. After a while it usually gets a bit heavy; too mushy, if you know what I mean.

Then there's always the career argument. Child and youth care is an emerging profession and the doors are wide open. Not many people believe this, but I've found it to be true. My career has moved ahead nicely and I'm even making a decent living now. Dwelling on this, however, rubs against my humanness and nothing makes me more uneasy than that.

I'm not religious, not in any traditional way. Although I suppose religion has more to do with it than I'm aware. When you get right down to it, God's will is a pretty powerful argument. But it's hard for me to put something entirely in someone else's hands. That's the old Scorpio in me, I guess. Now there's an idea! Maybe there's some astrological significance to all this. Naw.

Mythology might have an answer. Joseph Cambell, the author of the Mythic Image, said the most important thing myths have taught him is to follow his bliss. And come to think of it, I have been in a sort of blissful phase lately. Maybe it has something to do with rhythm and motion. Perhaps there's some mystical pace to all of this that I'm in synch with; like a guy who couldn't sing or dance in churches or dance halls who has suddenly found the right stage. I even reread Kerouac's Dharma Bums just to remind myself how lyrical this whole business of life and work can be. It's a romantic notion and pleasing to think about. But to be honest, there is still what Kurt Vonnegut calls an existential hum buzzing inside of me. There had to be more or perhaps less of something, I know it.

It gets confusing, this search for clarity about why I do it. Sometimes I wonder why it isn't enough to say I do it because I like it and leave it at that. But then that would take the fun out of it. Wouldn't it?

Mark Krueger, writing in The Journal of Child and Youth Care, Vol.4 No.2, pp 87-88
You can visit the Journal here.

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