Traditions

What a week/weekend of traditions for so many! Please take a moment to share your traditions with us in the comment section below.


As for me, I spend the week in Ohio, where I grew up. Now that I live out of state, I travel first into Columbus to reunite with dear friends from undergrad and beyond, flitting from friend to friend and (luckily) favorite restaurant to favorite restaurant. Then I head up to Northeast Ohio on Tuesday so I am ready for my favorite holiday tradition of the year; co-running a soup kitchen.

We make everything from scratch, so it takes all day Wednesday and the entire morning Thursday to prepare the foods; dozens of turkeys, hundreds of pounds of potatoes peeled and mashed, real pumpkin meat and scented spices for the pies, loaves and loaves of bread baked. We've had mostly the same volunteers for quite some time now so it's also an annual reunion of sorts. I've watched adults' kids grow up, those same adults have watched me grow up, and every year it becomes even more fun to work as a well-oiled cooking/baking machine.

Thursday afternoon is the day we serve to those who choose to come to us and deliver to those who do not, as well as the local fire and police departments of 3 towns. It's beyond wonderful to get to provide something for those who risk their lives to provide safety to us. Thursday night is dinner with my fictive family, followed by an early morning (4am) drive to the airport.

To round out my tradition, I typically arrive back in NYC around 7am, head home, and proceed to "take a nap," which almost always results in my waking up 6-8 hours later.

What about you? What do you do each year?

Body Art in the Workplace

As social workers, we're taught (and our Code of Ethics mandates) that we are to focus on the person, to overlook one's skin tone, gender, socioeconomic status, relationship history, drug use, and behaviors and to use strengths perspectives and goal orientation to assist our clients in reaching their goals, regardless of our personal opinions of their choices.

Do we do this with our coworkers, subordinates, and superiors?

I was just reading this article http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,223178,00.html about Body Art and Tattoos in the Workplace an discovered that "about half of people in their 20s have either a tattoo or a body piercing other than traditional earrings, according to a study published in June in the Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology." In the article, which was written in 2006, an interview subject suggests that we're "about 10 years away" from living in a world where bosses don't bat an eye at body modifications. Considering the publication date, this means we're only about 5 years away. Does this seem realistic to you?


What does that mean for social work? When you think honestly, would you hold a boss in different esteem if s/he had visible piercings or tattoos? Would you choose to hire someone who had them? Do YOU have them? If you do, are they intentionally covered during working hours? Should they be?

So many questions... I can't wait to read your thoughts!