Richard Howe | Work Life part 2

Work Life part 2

February 12, 2026 by DickH Posted in Uncategorized Leave a Comment

Work Life: Part 2

By Leo Racicot

When it became clear I was going to be trapped in Las Vegas indefinitely, I figured I’d try to get a job. With some library experience under my belt, I hoped to find work with one of the city’s libraries: a main library and 20 or more branch libraries scattered throughout the city. I didn’t know how wrong I was. At that time, getting a job in Las Vegas was centered around licensing and residency. Unless I wanted to hawk casino flyers along The Strip (and given the amount of discarded ones littering the sidewalks, many people did), I was at a loss as to where I could work; I knew nothing about being a croupier or gambling. (I don’t even know how to play poker or blackjack) and again, not having an established residency in the city made me persona non grata wherever I applied, even the town’s many branch libraries. It became frustrating on a daily basis to be turned down, turned away from jobs I was qualified for. I pounded the unbelievably hot pavement day-after-disappointing day. I remember one fellow, Mister Ko kept asking me to meet him for an interview “at the Denny’s on The Strip”, for work for his jewelry booth at the mall. I could never pin him down on which Denny’s he meant (there were several on the main drag) and gave up after more than a few tries. I learned you never knew what to expect in Vegas — liars/cons/thieves/unreliables. I became especially gung ho to work at the library branch on Flamingo Road, the most attractive of the Vegas libraries, with its pale pink sandstone tones and soft exterior lighting. But — my interviews there went nowhere.

Helen, knowing how much I like books, suggested I try a bookstore. I applied to the Borders Books and Music on Sahara Avenue for temporary holiday help. To my surprise and delight, Mr. Barry hired me and I breathed a sigh of relief that I’d finally gotten gainful employment, if only for a while. I liked the store’s atmosphere and my fellow workers. Though having to get used to my supervisor, Hilary, being a 22 year-old took some doing. She was nice enough, and respectful of me as an older worker, and we got along fine. I especially enjoyed my time on the Information Desk; it was similar to the role I’d played at O’Leary and pandered to my knack and my enthusiasm for research and helping patrons find what they were looking for. Unfortunately, it was at this time that Aunt Helen decided it would be best for me, now that I had a job, to find my own place, her major reason being that she and Cookie liked to take off all their clothes at home to keep cool in the sweltering heat and “we haven’t been able to do that with you in the house”. I found a rooming situation some miles away, fostered by a shifty guy named Bernie, who kept house for four other guys and me. I mention this only because an emergency situation arose in which two of my Borders’ co-workers played an instrumental role. A few months after moving in, on August 31st, 1997 — I remember the exact date because that was the day one of our housemates, Paul, walked in and announced that Princess Diana had been killed in a car crash in Paris — Bernie called me to his office and asked me where my rent was. I told him I’d put it in the rent box, as I usually did but he said he hadn’t received it. I didn’t understand why but he showed no sympathy and said he couldn’t wait for me to get my next paycheck at the bookstore. He literally threw me out, not even allowing me to gather up my clothes and other belongings. Helen wasn’t willing to let me come back to her house and I found myself homeless, or very nearly so. I’d just been hired as a hotel concierge by Desert Creek Ranch and Inn in the depths of Death Valley. but finding myself without a home base or my dress clothes made it impossible for me to report for my first day. It was a couple, Shane and Kari Jane, two co-workers who, hearing my plight, kindly said I could crash at their place until I could get myself on my feet. Had you asked me which of my co-workers would come to my rescue, and in such an unconditional way, Shane and Kari Jane would have been the last on my list. My life has been filled with unexpected guardian angels. Fortuitously, Joe was vacationing in Vegas, visiting me, and came to the rescue, with meals and money. It was a traumatic time; I was in a city I didn’t like and that didn’t like me. The heat was getting to me, the unsavory nature of the place itself, Bernie’s betrayal (the bank later confirmed he’d cashed my “missing” rent check). I wasn’t exactly the last of the high rollers and wasn’t interested in the city’s two main attractions: gambling and showgirls. Plus my temporary Borders holiday gig was coming to an end. I was at my wit’s end when the manager, Mr. Barry, said a friend of his who managed a nearby Bookstar (a West Coast subsidiary of Barnes and Noble) was hiring. As for somewhere new to live, I came across an ad for a rooming house on Edna Avenue. Edna was my mother’s name so I took it to be a sign that she was with me and steering me towards this place. In one and the same day, Bookstar hired me and the landlords of Edna Ave, Dick and Jenny, kind-hearted Mormons, rented me a room. Thank You, Jesus! My stint at not one but two Bookstar locations didn’t last. Vegas is a very transient city —people, situations come and go. The manager who’d hired me left and moved back to Chicago. The new manager wanted to start fresh, with a whole new crew. I, along with all other staff, were summarily laid off. I had to find new employment, in order to keep my living quarters on Edna Ave. I had grown to like it there, and liked my fellow roomies. I became especially close to an older man, a true Vegas character named Dancer. Dancer had been a gold miner, a rodeo champ, a carnival roustabout. He took me under-his-wing. Hearing how difficult a time I’d had since moving to Las Vegas, he offered wisdom and suggestions as to “how to survive in Sin City”. We watched many movies together, drinking soda, munching on popcorn and Dancer’s favorite candy, jellybeans. I’d never seen a person nurse one, single jelly bean for so long; he’d keep a piece in his mouth for hours, working it until it was smaller than a dime. His years of being out in the harsh Nevadan desert had left his skin, face-to-foot, with a leathery texture. He favored wearing jeans and a jean vest, sometimes a denim motor oil cap. I’ve tried over the years to locate him and if, indeed, I did, he’s close to 100 years old now, still living independently in Las Vegas. Unforgettable guy. Guy Tarantino was another housemate at Edna Avenue. Guy claimed to be a first cousin of the director, Quentin Tarantino. I liked Guy tremendously though he was forever trying to drag me out on all-nighters on The Strip, turn me into a Vegas player. But, I just didn’t have it in me. We did have some fun times, Guy even coaxing me up onto a karaoke stage. He joked, “Now you can say you performed on a Las Vegas stage!” A young guy we called “Dutch Mike” seemed harmless enough. Dutch was very generous; every Sunday, he’d treat the house to a couple of dozen Krispy Kreme donuts. On an impromptu room check, Dick and Diane found an arsenal of guns in his closet. Dutch explained them away as being “my hobby” but it was scary. In Las Vegas, you never knew who you knew or what they might be planning. He let each of us hold an Uzzi. I’d never been that close to a firearm. It was surprisingly light.

But to get back to my work woes — employment pickings were slim. I got a job at the YMCA, handing towels out to members. B-O-R-I-N-G but hey, it was money. The head of the fitness area was a cool guy named Joe Was. We bonded instantly when he asked where I was from. When I said, “Lowell, Mass”, he said, “No way! I’m from Lawrence”. My boss was a former Vegas showgirl, Laraine Burrell. She was pretty, and boy, didn’t she know it. Another Vegas character, of-a-sudden, she’d break into her old casino song-and-dance routine, do kicks and pirouettes. Us workers had to think fast and duck or we’d get a leg in the face. Laraine was moonlighting at the Y, studying nights to earn her law degree. Other “Y” workers I remember — Noli, a Filipino who’d come to Vegas, lost his shirt and found himself stuck there (not an uncommon story), Lois Whitaker who said when she and her husband found better jobs, they’d take me with them and didn’t, and a winsome girl from Hawaii nicknamed “Sweet Leilani”, a good-natured, helpful kid.

As strapped as I was for stability in this very unstable city, I got tired of handing one towel after another out to slick, sweaty customers, and I quit. My sister’s partner, Rico’s brother, Dean, who also happened to be living in Vegas, got me a job with Rainbow Cinemas. It was too far from Edna Avenue for me to walk. Aunt Helen (with whom I’d made some measure of peace) told me I could use Aunt Marie’s car to get to Rainbow. I accepted. This seemed to be the only way to keep myself going in that hell hole of a place. I was very depressed, missed the East Coast, especially the change in seasons and had lost a lot of weight (I was down to 128 lbs). I liked cinema work — perks for employees offered free movies! One woman named Sylvia was so kind to me, especially when, after only a couple of weeks of working there, Marie’s car bought the farm and couldn’t be resurrected. For a day or two, I walked miles to-and-from work until Sylvia, seeing I was on the verge of collapse, offered to pick me up and take me home on workdays. But –(and no kindness ever goes unpunished), a week or two into this free ride, poor Sylvia’s car conked out, also never to be resurrected. There was no way for me or her to keep our jobs.

This was the last straw in my star-crossed years in Vegas; I’d only moved out there to lend a helping hand to Helen and my cousin. I demanded Helen pay for a return flight to Massachusetts. I’d had it up to here…I remember saying to her, “This place is killing me!”

Back home in New England, I stayed with Diane and Rico for a time. Then, it was back to the employment drawing board.

There was an ad in the classified section of The Boston Phoenix. It read: “Room in Harvard Square in exchange for work with disturbed youth.” I saw it again when looking for a job. This same ad had been running verbatim for years and years and I was curious as to how this person was still “a youth”. Mostly out of desperation, I called the number listed from a pay phone. A feeble female voice answered and I asked if she could tell me more about the job. She explained that the work involved caring for her autistic son (whom she still didn’t explain was no longer “a youth”) and asked my age. When I said I was 45, she said, “Oh, no, that won’t do. I have only area grad students here, most in their early 20s.” As she added “I’m sorry”, I could hear her pulling the phone away from her ear, to hang up. I shouted, “No! Please! Wait! I heard her bringing the phone back and she said, “Yes??” I explained that I’d had a lot of experience working with special needs populations, not only in work settings but also personally and told her I’d just come back from three years looking after my handicapped cousin. “Well, she said, “Why don’t you come in for an interview?” I should have let her hang up…

I’ve already written about my consecutive stints with The Sheas (as a companion/cook) and with Cambridge Public Libraries. Those nine years would fill a whole book.

In 2007, the economic climate led to my being laid off from both jobs and I came back to Lowell, tail between my legs, to once again lick the fresh wounds of unemployment. Again, Diane and Rico let me work out my depression with them. I finally found work dog-sitting for my friend, Sally. Sally was to join her partner, Mitch, who did entertainment lighting for entertainers like Michael Jackson, in L.A. and whose two Boston terriers, Reuben “Ruby” and Shecky needed a sitter for the couple’s time away. Ruby was an always a loveable “licker” and liked me. Shecky hated my guts and that became so obvious, Sally decided it would be too problematic for me to handle both dogs on my own so she boarded him, leaving me with the very passionate Ruby, whom I became very fond of. Ruby had a green ball he was overly fond of. It was rare to find him without it in his mouth; he carried that ball everywhere. At night, he’d sleep with it clenched between his teeth. His Linus “security blanket”. Sally and Mitch owned a large, cozy loft on The Riverway. Looking back, I realize my stay there, surrounded by the Scheherezade decor and by the ever-entertaining Ruby helped heal me of my miseries.

In around 2010 or thereabouts, I was contacted on Facebook by the writer, Edmund White. To this day, I’m not sure what compelled him to contact me. I guess it was a combination of his noticing on social media my work-related posts on Facebook about having been a caregiver and sometime editor/proofreader and had been friends with M.F.K. Fisher. He also found it “cool” that actress Bette Davis, a favorite of his, hailed from my hometown of Lowell, and that I’d majored in French language and literature in college. Edmund had suffered a series of strokes and was recovering at his New York City home. In March of 2012, he wrote to ask if I might be willing to come act as his caregiver/typist/all-around-man. The pay offered was more than generous and the chance to be around a well-known author was tempting. I said “yes”. We agreed I’d come in April of that year. But he changed his mind, said someone would be helping him in the month of April and could I please come in May? I said, “Okay”. But May came and Ed changed his mind again, said his sister, Margi, would be staying with him for a couple of months and — “Can we make it July?” I began thinking this was all some kind of joke but didn’t want to offend the great Edmund White whose work I had always admired. Besides, I hadn’t found work here in the area so I agreed to the switch. In July, I rode the bus down and literally walked the distance from New York’s Port Authority on 42nd and 8th Avenue to Ed’s place on 22nd Street, suitcase in hand. Had I known how many blocks had to be traversed, I would have taken a taxi cab. Outside a flower shop on 8th Avenue, my nerves started to collapse. It took me a while before I called to stay, “I’m here”. Ed buzzed me in and I took the elevator up to the second floor. There, standing in the doorway was quite the largest man I’d ever seen. Ed’s face had a great, beaming, welcoming smile, his great girth filling the entire doorway. I’m big but Ed, whom I noticed was my height exactly, was bigger. His instant friendliness dispelled my fear as he ushered me into his home. Truth be told, his boyfriend, Michael, was not as cordial. He looked me over head-to-toe. A look of disdain came over his face. He hurried to a room and slammed the door. Ed apologized for him, explained that he (Michael) was stressed, that he was going down to Chapel Hill, to help a friend move up to Boston. But I intuited that Michael’s behavior had little to do with stress. In gay culture, if a guy is fat, homely and shy, trust me — he doesn’t count for much. Michael seemed horrified that I, who looked nothing like my Facebook photos, had shown up in his home. He did cede his room, a beautiful, book-filled room, to me for the duration of my stay. That night, I could hear Ed reading Michael The Riot Act. “He’s come all this way TO HELP US!! Be nice!” In the morning, at the breakfast table, the air had cleared. Before departing for the bus station, Michael gave me one of the warmest hugs and kisses I’d ever received.

Ed was a charming host, a superlative fellow. I don’t think I was the best employee he’d ever found but he must have liked me; he was to invite me back half-a-dozen more times. We became friends and these stays with him were more like vacations than work. He squired me all around Manhattan: to Lincoln Center where we saw Balanchine’s Jewels, to an East Village bar where we were present at the debut of now-acclaimed poet/novelist, Ocean Vuong, to a performance of Uncle Vanya at City Center with Cate Blanchett. Ed was generous, at times, ridiculously so. He was endlessly witty, endlessly erudite, endlessly kind. I loved working with him on his books, my favorite being his memoir, Inside a Peal: My Paris Years. When asked to re-arrange his extensive home library, it was a hoot attempting to navigate my way through the many tiers of books each shelf held, on the verge of collapse they were. Avalanche! Of course, Ed had his quirks and tics. Don’t we all?

He could be blustery, unreasonable, temperamental. He was, after all, Edmund White. He passed in 2025 and I miss him, miss his emails, miss his quixotic phone calls. He had a habit of calling out-of-the-blue, chiming excitedly, “Quick!, write this down!” and would dictate some memory he’d resurrected, an anecdote he wanted preserved. Ed’s company, whether in person or on the page, made of life something sparkling, something special.

Saying I had a checkered work life is an understatement. I look back and wish I’d had more steady employment but am grateful for the wealth of stories my peripatetic job history has left me with.

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