"It’s like, if nothing goes wrong, this stuff is invisible, but if something does go wrong, people are gonna be extremely upset.”

sounds a lot like stage management!!!

and traffic engineering! Does anyone ever think, “Wow, traffic is flowing very well today and the traffic lights are working just like they should”?  Nope.  But let there be one glitch in the signal system and everyone is pissed off.

Thanksless jobs abound.  Thanks for reminding me that I’m not alone.  Maybe that should be part of our job descriptions.

FWIW Lori, I fixate on traffic flow.  I watch the timed lights, the duration of “walk/don’t walk” signs, how long cross-traffic gets the green as opposed to arterial - one of my hobbies.  Along with making wax molds of my navel.  A man’s got to keep busy during those red lights and traffic jams.

How do you manage to create mental images that crack me up and gross me out at the same time? wax moldings of your belly button? eewww!

i believe people do a good job mostly for themselves.  you work the way you do for yourself.  i don’t know how to put that.  the words aren’t coming easy.  or pretty.  but how lucky you are that you can feel that the work you do is important.  gotta have that. 

but the belly-button thing—ewww.

Training for a literacy program! You are awesome! Good show, old man. Really. I’m so proud. You are doing it. (I started one in San Diego in 1991. 18 people showed up, 15 finished, and to this day, I get reports occassionally from about four of the people who still are teaching adults to read. They say it is the “best-feeling job” they have had in their whole life experience, to teach someone how to read. And they make personal friends with all of these people, extending their nuclear families--not usual, I know, but these are very unusual friends, with very big hearts.)
Your personal rewards will exponentially be far superior to the efforts you make. I congratulate you and wish you the very best.