+This was fine, for a while. I learned from my books, and—there was a _dignity_ to working at the supermarket. It was boring, to be sure, but at least I had some function other than simply to obey a designated authority. You can _tell_ when a customer's latte is too foamy, or the coinmag on checkstand 1 needs to be swapped out, on its own terms, and not because the teacher said so.
+
+But making $9.40 an hour at the supermarket indefinitely (and paying a nominal rent to live with my mom) didn't seem like an acceptable destiny for someone of my social class. It was assumed that at some point, I would have to figure out how to get a grown-up job (although my colleagues who had been at the supermarket for 30 years probably wouldn't approve of me calling it that).
+
+[TODO—
+A+ cert, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heald_College, diff eqs., ending up in community college/SFSU]