The illusion of prestige. Valuing fun.

I learn far more from my kids than they learn from me, I tell you.

My youngest and I have almost an hour each day alone together at the moment as we do the school-run between two different schools - dropping off her two older siblings earlier and collecting them later.

I am really enjoying our time together to chat. Just the two of us. She's a quiet one. And her older sister isn't. So oftentimes I don't get to hear an awful lot from her.

She has been catching the school bus to swimming lessons and she was telling me about her dream to one day stand in the aisle while the bus is in motion.

And then the conversation moved to the school bus drivers who have been driving her to school swimming lessons.

"There's this one guy with a beard - he's really nice, but the other guy always drives up the kerbs," she said.
"Always?" I questioned, laughing, wondering if she'd noticed my kerb-hitting ways.
"Yep. When we go around corners we all wait to see if we are going to hit it. It's kind of fun in a way. Anyway, I was talking to Daniel and I was telling him about how my Poppy was a bus driver," she said proudly.

"Did you?' I asked wanting her to say more. And she did.

"Yeah and I told him about how Poppy worked as a security guard on Garden Island."

"You sound as if you think that's really cool?" I questioned further.

"It is," she said matter-of-factly.

Conversation over.

And I realised - it is cool.

Why do we grown-ups attach prestige to jobs? Why? Is it salary?
Really?
Is it because we think corporate types are smarter? Because I know that is not true at all. Total bollocks in fact.

I can tell you this. Currently, I have a prestigious job. Probably the most prestigious job I have ever had.
And I tell you this. I had much more self-respect, better work-life balance and definitely more fun working at Hungry Jacks, Woolworths and all my other 'low prestige' jobs.

Maybe we should be more like my 10-year-old and base job prestige not on education, not on salary and not on power wielded.

But on fun.

Fun.

What a concept.