I worked as a construction hand in my home town during the summer between college semesters. My boss claimed to be an ex-marine who killed many Iraqis and suffered brain damage as a result of his combat experience. I wasn’t really getting paid much; only 10$ an hour, but I took the job seriously and did overtime every chance I could. I thought it would be interesting to work with tradesman and get to see what other peoples jobs are like everyday. My boss was pretty strange as he had an obsession with bringing up killing people like every other work day and he seemed to never sleep. I just ignored him for the most part and did my job, working as a hard as I could. Eventually he had some freak outs where he would start berating me, screaming at me that I would never become anything. I thought it was so awkward and somewhat scary; I would just walk away from the construction site when he would do that bc he always claimed to be carrying weapons too.
The day came when I had to go back to school so I told him I was quitting one day and he had, yet again, another freak out. He told me I was too weak to stay with him and that I would be back to work with him, “like they all do eventually”.
He then told everyone in my small town that I was a homosexual and I would get harassed about it by some of the other tradesmen that I used to work on sites with. It got around to some of my friends and they ditched me as they are homophobic and can’t be seen around someone accused of being a homosexual; especially by a brave Marine.
Is this a normal experience in the trades?