By Joan Opyr |


Most writers have day jobs. Unless we’re lucky enough to have caught a popular wave of some sort – boy wizards, romantic vampires, or terrifying fathers with psychic sons snowed in for the winter at a Colorado hotel – we have to think of some way to support our typing habit. It isn’t always easy. Some of us do a lot of freelance work. We write humor columns and do interviews. Others go into technical writing, and even more of us do some mixture of freelance and “real world” work. Not long ago, I added CNA to my collection of jobs. When I’m not writing, I’m taking care of the elderly in a nursing home, a job that is more than paying back in the writing department.

For example, I was working with an Alzheimer’s patient who was adamant that his car had been stolen. Rather than argue with him, I asked him to describe the make and the model. He thought for a moment, looked at me, and said, “How the hell should I know? I’ve got Alzheimer’s.”

I have a tiny little woman who calls me Chauncey. This is so we can run off to Hawaii together. We were planning our escape at lunch one day, and she asked my last name. When I told her “Opyr,” she tried spelling that a couple of times and said, “No, no, that won’t do. I can’t go anywhere with a name like that.” I asked what name she could go with, and she said without missing a beat, “Chauncey.”

I have been groped in the nursing home. I was bending over to take an old man’s blood pressure when, like lightening, he reached out with his free hand to cop a feel. By this time, I was getting savvy to the joint. I told him, politely, to knock it off. When he refused, I reminded him that this was a nursing home and not a strip club. That’s why I don’t get tips, and he doesn’t get the rectal thermometer.

Quite apart from the intrinsic value of the work, not a day goes by when there is not something worth recording in the nursing home. The elderly are fascinating. They’ve lived long, full lives, not much shocks or surprises them, but they take great delight in shocking and surprising you. A woman in her mid-80s gave us a disquisition at lunch on gay marriage. The theme? Why should anyone care if gay people marry? Who are they hurting? She thinks the people who are opposing us are too young to have any perspective. “If they were a bit closer to death, or had Parkinson’s or an artificial hip, then they’d really have something to worry about, and they’d leave other people alone.”

Old people are fascinating – a rich vein for the writer to mine. This is the best day job ever.


Joan Opyr (she/her) is a gigantic crank. Her life is frequently weird, and she enjoys writing and talking about that. She’s a transplanted Southerner who dreams of golden beaches, sweet iced tea, and sunny skies. She believes that Eva Cassidy should be beatified. Oh, and she’s also an award-winning novelist.
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