Please say HI to your daughter for me. She’s such a great help and I’m still using her instruction for printing labels from my list up to the date. Thank you for raising such a good child.
– Written in Comic Sans by my parents’ life insurance agent

Several years ago when I was in debt and relying on the parents for income, I agreed to help their life insurance agent with computer work. Well ok, I didn’t happily agree. I was lazing about that year not quite sure what I would be doing after college—work or grad school. I went with my mom to an appointment she had with the life insurance agent—a giddy Asian woman with charismatic personality named Lisa.

After some tedious meeting, my mom said aloud, “My daughter is looking for a job!”

I wanted to hide, but I found myself offering my IT services. For the next few years, I would come into her office and help her with complex tasks on the computer. Most of the time, it was taking her master list of contacts and making mailing labels—she didn’t know how to import the contacts list to the mailing labels application. She believed in sending christmas cards to every client and I often myself putting labels on each envelope, gluing stamps and sealing. Then sometimes it would be me filing her work.

I really hated it, but it passed the time. For whatever reason, I never really taught her how to do it and came back a few more times. Until I couldn’t stand it anymore and made a document for making mailing labels with screenshots and explicit instructions.

My dad had dropped that letter in a bag he gave me. When I first saw it, I was happy that she was still chugging along. Hopefully I’ll never have to return to do mundane office work.

Back then, she often said that I was faster than any temp worker she hired. Why is that? Because I know my alphabet when I file?