Robert and I work as night managers at an independent retirement community. We actually live here in an apartment behind the front desk, and we answer the telephones, the door, respond to emergencies and handle anything generally that comes up at night. It’s independent retirement, meaning everyone can generally take care of themselves, so it’s not an extremely busy job-most of the time.

I’ve found that the hardest part of this job, for me, is keeping secrets. What I mean is, sometimes a resident has an emergency-all the other residents see the ambulances and want to know if it’s their for their friends-and unless the person in question tells me I can, I can’t tell you if that’s your friend going away in the ambulance. This is for their privacy-and it’s something I find morally questionable, it’s not my place to tell you these things, and if I did, it would be a betrayal of confidence. People call me in some embarrassing and personal situations-and I believe in the reasons I keep my mouth shut.

The hard part is though saying no, I can’t tell you that, when I know you’re asking for the very best reasons. When I know that it physically hurts not knowing what happened to your friend, I feel terrible that I can’t tell you.

What’s funny about this, really, is that when I moved out of my parents house I made a conscious decision to live an honest life. No secrets, no lies-this ia  big part of my life. And yet, I chose a job where I’m frequently keeping things from about a hundred people who live all around me. Life is funny like that. Or, well, people are funny like that.