by Sarah Miley

STAFF WRITER

School's out, the sun is shining and the first day of summer is tomorrow. I think a large part of the summer experience for teens is a job, which can mean financial independence from your parents. I know that's what it used to mean for me.

My first summer job was as a lifeguard at Raging Waters in Salt Lake when I was 17 years old. Up until that point, the $7.50 I got for washing the kitchen floors and the $4 for oiling the cupboards my mother gave me each week had kept me stocked up on funds. But at 17, I knew it wouldn't be enough anymore.

While soaking up rays may not seem like a stressful job, it had its moments, especially when parents wouldn't watch their 2-year-old and he or she would wander into the pool, causing me to have to go in Baywatch-style for a rescue.

But being a lifeguard did have its entertaining moments as well, like hearing pick-up lines from 13-year-old boys like "Do you know CPR?" and after saying "Yes,' hearing "Good, cause you take my breathe away" in response.

Other summer job stints of mine included working as an office manager for a company that made video games. At this place, employees would often take a break during the day, turn off the lights, put on headsets and virtually shoot each other for about an hour. I also worked as a newsroom assistant at the Salt Lake Tribune, which was slightly less violent.

One of my least favorite jobs was working in guest services at This is the Place Heritage Park in Salt Lake City, which mostly involved manning the ticket booth and answering phones, but on several embarrassing occasions required me to don a flowery pink pioneer skirt.

Still, my most favorite summer job was when I had just graduated from high school and worked as a part-timer at the Davis School District as a sprinkler girl. This is where I met my husband.

For the first week or so, I worked with Cob, a 6-foot-7-inch man who I was afraid of at first. Then I began working with a man named Miley. (His first name is Jason but nobody called him that and I didn't know it was his first name until about a month after I began working with him. Needless to say, I still call him Miley).

We drove around in a work truck to all the different schools in the district, digging holes, replacing nozzles, fixing broken pipes, installing new sprinklers and testing out sprinkler clocks.

This job was fulfilling and the proof of hard work was evident after each day -- dirt underneath my fingernails and caked on my knees, legs and arms.

Each summer, Miley, who was a seasoned hand at this, would be assigned a new part-timer to work with. He never called them by their real names, and in following with that tradition I was named "Joey." He still calls me that and only calls me "Sarah" when we're at my family functions or places where people are unfamiliar with our changed names. Other part-timers' names included "Perfect Posture Girl" (she always stood up straight), "Kleenex" and "Borgstyle," to name a few.

You really get to know someone if you spend eight hours a day with them for three straight months. He still claims our first date was when he bought me a tiger's blood flavored snow cone from a Sno Shack after a particularly long, hot day of digging in the ground. He got peach.

That was five years ago and we just celebrated our one-year wedding anniversary this month.

While summer jobs can get you a great tan, or require you to wear something totally embarrassing, the people you meet are often the best part.

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