Richard Cohen Quotes

My first job was with an auto plant, Kansas City - they treated you like slaves. From there I went back to Chicago, worked in steel mills, drove a cab, stuff like that.

Physical labor, manual labor - if you can stay close to those folks, there's always plenty to write about, 'cause their issues are real issues.

As a little boy, my first job was delivering newspapers, and then I had a variety of different jobs. I worked in a butcher shop. I worked in a supermarket. I worked in construction. I dug ditches on the Long Island Expressway in 1954, 1955, 1956.

I've worked everywhere. I worked in a warehouse packing surf supplies, a restaurant washing dishes, in retail, and I was a 'sandwich artist' at Subway.

My mother was a cleaning lady all her life.

My dad had this rock hard body and would work 12- to 13-hour days. The guys he worked with were scrap-iron guys. Nobody on that road crew had read a book in 10 years, but there was something about the way they lived I really admired.

My father was a manual worker.

To make money I picked up work as a busboy, valet parker, skateboard shop employee.

My dad was a golden gloves boxer in the Marine Corps, then a deputy sheriff. My mom worked as an office assistant.

I started out printing silk screen t-shirts. I sold ink pens. I worked construction. I worked at a gas station. I pumped gas. I was a mechanic for a little bit. I went into sewers, down into sewer lines. I had a lot of somewhat unpleasant gigs for a time there.

People say writing is really hard. That's very unfair to those who are doing real jobs. People who work in the fields or fix roofs, engineers, or car mechanics. I think lying on your back working under an oily car, that's a job.

I was a mechanic at a go-cart place, a deejay at a roller rink, a telemarketer in New York, a grocery bagger.

My mom was a waitress, and my dad was a plumber who worked for the City of San Clemente fixing mains breaks, so not too glamorous.

I class myself as a manual laborer.

A lot of what we do at Fox is blue-collar stuff.

I worked a lot of non-acting jobs for a really long time. They ranged from auto mechanic to landscaper to manual labor to working in a factory that made airplane parts. I even tried to go to school as a paramedic and ended up being an orderly in a hospital.

My dad, he was a construction worker. He was a butcher. He was a deep sea fisherman.

I shined shoes; I did windows.

People I grew up with, my family, work in the oil fields. Everyone works a labor job - construction, concrete. All we know is work. It's a physical culture.

My dad started off in scrap metal, real men doing men's jobs.

I worked in factories, slaughterhouses, as an upholsterer. I did demolition work, was a postman, was a tiler, a plasterer. I even sold double-glazing door-to-door. But I always dreamed of being a world champion, first of all as a boxer.

My parents were blue-collar.

I was a bartender, a hot-dog vendor, a cook, sold magazine subscriptions.

I grew up middle class, my best friends to this day are construction workers or military or whatever it is.

My parents were workers. My mom, especially in my high school years, was a stock clerk at Kmart... My dad was a bartender that worked banquets.