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The past few years have drastically changed how we think about our relationship to work, perhaps permanently. However, they haven’t changed the fact that billions of people on this planet spend about half their waking hours exchanging labor for money in order to secure food and shelter. As such, work has remained an inescapable part of one’s identity. “What do you do?” is still a small-talk question not because the answer is usually interesting, but because the answer tells you something about the skills and knowledge that person has amassed. And when the answer is interesting, it’s hard not to feel some measure of admiration for someone whose experience falls so outside your own.

I’ve always been fascinated by those whose daily occupations carry meaning, promise adventure, or are in any way out of the ordinary. Of course, everybody’s dream job is different, but imagine swapping sitting at a computer or working on a production line for clearing landmines, dodging tornadoes, or braving the icy waters of the Bering Sea. Not for everyone, of course—but what astonishing ways to earn a living. 

The examples you’ll encounter below range from the inspirational to the unfathomable. Who would want to toil 18-hour days, or climb to dizzying heights with little to no protection? For some, that sort of life holds a deep appeal, and herein lies the hook that draws you into these stories: In attempting to understand the motivations of others, we are by reflex attempting to understand ourselves. Each of these pieces moved me in some way, and I hope that they move you also.

Chasing Tornadoes (Priit J. Vesilind, National Geographic, April 2004)

As this mesmerizing article points out, it was the 1996 film Twister that first brought the occupation of “tornado chaser” to widespread public attention. Twister was a big deal upon its release, and I can vividly recall being spellbound by the then-cutting-edge special effects: dark and furious tendrils reaching down from the sky to pluck people, cars, and houses into the sky, spinning like toys, seemingly cut adrift from gravity itself. That film, as all movies do, exaggerated the hazards faced by its protagonists—but, judging by this primary account, not by very much. That meteorologists are still throwing themselves at deadly storms nearly 30 years on tells much of the complexity behind this destructive and spectacular weather phenomenon. 

In order to study tornados, you have to get close enough to manually drop heavy probes in their path, sometimes less than 100 meters from an approaching maelstrom. In a way, it’s comforting to know that, for all our technology and sophistication, we are in no way removed from the natural systems that surround us. Nature can always outdo us, will always win. That’s not to minimize the human cost, however, nor the bravery and determination of the tornado chasers. From the very beginning, in which an entire village is sucked into the air, this piece delivers mind-boggling drama, immersing us in a disparate group of specialists who race across the United States to seek out something most others would sooner avoid—all in the interest of furthering our understanding of an uncontrollable phenomenon.

But we’re late, and out of position. If we try to drive around the storm, we won’t have enough daylight left to see it. So we decide to “punch the core” of the thunderstorm, forcing our way into the “bear’s cage,” an area between the main updraft and the hail. It’s an apt name: Chasing tornadoes is like hunting grizzlies—you want to get close, but not on the same side of the river. Sometimes you get the bear; sometimes the bear gets you.

And so we head straight into the storm and find ourselves splattering mud at 60 miles an hour (97 kilometers an hour) on a two-lane road, threatening to hydroplane, visibility near zero. Anton is less than comforting. “The hail in the bear’s cage smashes windows and car tops,” he shouts, grinning. “The smaller stuff is kept aloft by the updraft, and only the large chunks fall. It’s like small meteorites banging down. Ha-ha-ha!”

In The Race For Better Cell Service, Men Who Climb Towers Pay With Their Lives (Ryan Knutson and Liz Day, ProPublica, May 2012)

Once again, we encounter a piece that draws aside the invisible curtain to glimpse the grueling efforts that enable our everyday creature comforts—in this case, the world of mobile communications networks. If you’ve ever shuddered at a TikTok video of a worker balanced precariously atop a tower at vertigo-inducing heights, this article probably isn’t for you. Yet, for such a dangerous job—cell tower climbing routinely claims up to 10 times the number of human lives as the conventional construction industry—it pays a relatively modest wage. What is it, then, that drives people to take up such work?

As a project manager quoted in the piece says, “You’ve got to have a problem to hang 150 feet in the air on an eight-inch strap.” Yet the workers featured in this piece, despite some suffering horrible injuries, clearly love their jobs. It’s not hard to understand the buzz that must come from routinely doing something that most people could not (and would not) do, along with sense of freedom that must come with climbing aloft to look down upon the world. As with the cobalt mining industry—itself the subject of another story in this list—there is a dark underside to this business, as sub-contractors routinely cut corners and take risks in the quest for a few extra dollars.

The greatness in Knutson and Day’s article, as with others collected here, lies in its ability to bring to life the stories and personalities of the people whose hard work makes life easier for us all. If you’re reading this on your smartphone, take a moment to consider the often-obscured reality behind mobile technology—a technology that, by its very nature, is largely invisible.

The surge of cell work forever altered tower climbing, an obscure field of no more than 10,000 workers. It attracted newcomers, including outfits known within the business as “two guys and a rope.” It also exacerbated the industry’s transient, high-flying culture.

Climbers live out of motel rooms, installing antennas in Oklahoma one day, building a tower in Tennessee the next. The work attracts risk-takers and rebels. Of the 33 tower fatalities for which autopsy records were available, 10 showed climbers had drugs or alcohol in their systems.

The Cobalt Pipeline (Todd C. Frankel, The Washington Post, September 2016)

This is where mobile technology begins: the dangerous and dirty business of mining for cobalt, a mineral essential to the construction of smartphones and laptops. As a species we are finally becoming aware that every modern amenity carries an ecological price, and that price is often paid most dearly (and ironically) by nations that are monetarily poor but resource-rich. In our relentless drive “forward,” it is often the most vulnerable who pay the price. Mining is not a calling for these men; it is a necessity.

However, there is hope to be found in this troubling story—specifically, the very fact of its existence. The best journalism reduces global issues to a human scale, and by taking us into the lives of Congolese miners risking life and limb in pursuit of the rare metal, writer Todd C. Frankel forces us to ask ourselves some uncomfortable questions.  

But Mayamba, 35, knew nothing about his role in this sprawling global supply chain. He grabbed his metal shovel and broken-headed hammer from a corner of the room he shares with his wife and child. He pulled on a dust-stained jacket. A proud man, he likes to wear a button-down shirt even to mine. And he planned to mine by hand all day and through the night. He would nap in the underground tunnels. No industrial tools. Not even a hard hat. The risk of a cave-in is constant.

“Do you have enough money to buy flour today?” he asked his wife.

She did. But now a debt collector stood at the door. The family owed money for salt. Flour would have to wait.

Mayamba tried to reassure his wife. He said goodbye to his son. Then he slung his shovel over his shoulder. It was time.

Making Our Home Safe Again: Meet the Women Who Clear Land Mines (Jessie Williams, The Observer, January 2021)

War leaves scars on every country it touches, sometimes literally: one of its most insidious instruments is buried explosives, set to trigger at the touch of a human foot. Land mines have been a topic of discussion for many years, catapulted to the front of the news in 1997, when Princess Diana raised awareness by walking through a field of live explosives in Angola. (She was a guest of the Halo Trust, an organization that undertakes the arduous and dangerous task of clearing such places for the local populace.)

Little can be more terrifying than the knowledge that each step you take could be your last. It’s a sudden, senseless, death, one without discernment or mercy. But in this inspiring story, life comes full circle, as Hana Khider returns to her ancestral homeland of the Sinjar mountains in northwestern Iraq. When Khider was a child, her mother told her stories of the family homeland they were forced to flee; now, as an adult, she works as part of a team of deminers, making that homeland safe once again. As meaningful as this work is, it also carries with it the deadliest of dangers: an average of nine people a day still fall victim to these terrible remnants of conflict.

At the start of this month, a 24-year-old man working for MAG was killed in an explosion at a munitions storage facility in Iraq’s Telefar district – a reminder of the dangers these deminers face every single day. Iraq has around 1,800 sq km of contaminated land (an area bigger than Greater London) stemming from multiple conflicts, including the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s, the Gulf War, the 2003 US-led invasion, and the Isis occupation of 2014. The Iraqi government has a target deadline of February 2028 to clear the country, which Morgan thinks is optimistic. “Last year, operators cleared just over 15 sq km,” he says. Covid-19 hasn’t helped. This year MAG has managed to disarm 1,200 mines; usually it would be 6,750 mines.

Dispatches: Life on an Alaskan Crab Boat (Andy Cochrane, Men’s Journal, April 2021)

We have always projected a certain romance onto the idea of working on the high seas, and a dignity upon those individuals brave enough to do so. For this piece, journalist Andy Cochrane signs up for a week’s work on the fishing boat Silver Spray, one of just 60 such vessels responsible for supplying all of North America with snow crab. Facing long hours, rough water, and freezing conditions, the work is as grueling as could be imagined, but surprisingly Cochrane encounters only good humor, pragmatism, and an inspiring sense of brotherhood amongst the crew.

This is work that is as fundamental to human existence as can be found. People have to eat, after all. But what really strikes me about this piece—and is a sentiment echoed by its author—is the remarkable positivity of the fishermen, which surely can’t be put down to a sense of pride and decent wages alone. Perhaps it’s the extreme conditions and the hardships that help foster such a sense of togetherness and wry determination. Whatever the cause, this is another absorbing peek into a job few of us would wish to undertake.

I was curious how these guys found their way to the industry and how they hadn’t burned out. Attrition is incredibly high, for obvious reasons—freezing temperatures, rough seas and long, exhausting hours. All three laughed off my greenhorn question, and we returned to tips on how I would survive the week.

Jose, an immigrant from El Salvador and father of two, has lived in Anchorage since the ’90s. Quiet, always smiling, and always working, he’s fished his entire career. Leo, raised in Samoa and now living in Vegas, also has two kids. Even with frozen fingers and toes, he never stopped making jokes. Jeffery, who lives half the year in the Philippines with his wife and three kids, would often give me a fist bump and say “you’ll be all right, everyone goes through this” after I puked, which happened 11 more times the first day.

Chris Wheatley is a writer and journalist based in Oxford, U.K. He has too many guitars, too many records, and not enough cats.

Editor: Peter Rubin
Copy Editor: Carolyn Wells

THAT YEAR, Jess’s daughter Halima turned 19, the same age Jess was when she had her. Halima was working that summer in Belize, where Jess’s mother lived and owned a cafe. Jess’s mother once had a publishing business near Detroit. Detroit is where Jess met her ex, Halima’s father, who she left after three years squirrelling away leftover grocery money, the only money her ex had ever allowed her for her independence. Jess kept a secret credit card, she told me, and left their home only with the clothes she was wearing. She went to her stepdad’s, applied for a trucking job, and was on a bus to a training facility in Indiana four days later. Halima spent fifth grade on the road. They solved math problems with dry erase markers on the truck’s windows and played catch in warehouse parking lots. On Halloween, Jess was picking up at a Hershey’s facility in Virginia. Normally security guards give truckers a chocolate bar or two, but when Halima said, “Trick or treat!” the guard dumped his whole basket of chocolates into her pillowcase. That was in 2012.

TWO MONTHS AFTER WE MET, Jess invited me to Las Vegas, where she and her friends from REAL Women in Trucking were gathering for the organization’s annual “Queen of the Road” ceremony. On a hot August night, we met up at a patio bar in the Flamingo Hotel and Casino, where actual Chilean flamingos lived in a marshy enclosure with catfish and koi. She was sitting, with Halima, at a long wooden table surrounded by women truckers. “This is Idella,” Jess said, introducing me to a silver-haired woman wearing a white button-down patterned with palm fronds. I recognized her name from admiring stories Jess had shared on the road. Idella told me she was based in Arkansas, where she moved high-value goods. “When I sit in the seat, there’s something in the diesel that turns into I’ve got to go,” she told me. “I’m good at what I do. The harder it is, the more challenging it is, the more I like it. Without a challenge, I have no purpose.”

Constantly navigating a 2020 news cycle that eats itself and a Twitter stream that endlessly flows, “social media managers are first responders,” writes Marta Martinez. The people tasked with handling social media at a company are expected to stay abreast of what’s happening in the world, react swiftly, and act as an official voice for a brand. Yet individuals in these roles are not always provided the support and resources to do their jobs well, and the time and effort involved in this type of work, including strategy, content creation, and community management, is often dismissed as trivial. Hey, can you whip up a few tweets? Can you promote this on our accounts? Let’s launch more channels! Let’s build a community! 

Under “normal” circumstances, social media management is hard work that requires a varied skillset. In 2020, it’s a stressful and hazardous job, says Matthew Kobach, who worked as the New York Stock Exchange’s social media manager, and one that should be paid accordingly.

At OneZero, Martinez reports on the experiences of social media managers and strategists during the pandemic and Black Lives Matter protests, at organizations like DCist, the University of Michigan, and Mount Sinai Health System.

Brown has not been able to meet most of her co-workers in person yet and, as a social media manager and a young Black woman, she often wonders whether she is being taken seriously as an equal professional within the newsroom. Social media managers are in high demand. But these jobs are often performed by young people who are underpaid. The national average salary of a social media manager is about $57,000, considerably less than what marketing managers make — over $135,000.

Social media managers are making important — and very public — decisions all the time. They need to respond to news and conversations quickly to be effective. The public voice and image of companies, media outlets, public figures, and institutions are in their hands at a very delicate time. Yet their job is still often seen as something anyone could do, or left to those who are just getting started in their careers.

“It’s like putting an intern to be your press secretary,” says Alan Rosenblatt, a social media consultant for political campaigns who teaches digital and social media strategy at George Washington University and Johns Hopkins University. “It’s a recipe for disaster.”

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Katya Cengel | Longreads | December 2019 | 10 minutes (2,513 words)

I punched a series of numbers into a cordless phone, waited for a prompt and then punched a dozen or so more. Before Skype there was PennyTalk. The phone card saved you money, not time, requiring the input of a long account number, followed by an equally long password, and a no less extensive foreign phone number. At present I was using the cumbersome process to my advantage, trying to figure out how I would break the news to my Ukrainian fiancé that he would be joining me not in California, but in Kentucky.

Dima was from Kyiv. He photographed news and fashion in the Ukrainian capital. He was sweet, funny — and a snob.

The voice that picked up on the other end was distant and distracted.

“Hi Dimka,” I said, hoping the use of the further diminutive of the diminutive of his name would somehow make up for what I was about to tell him.

“Katiushinka!” His voice softened in recognition. “How are you? How is the job hunt?”

***

My search for a job in journalism was the topic we began most conversations with back in 2003. I had returned to the U.S. several months earlier after having spent the first few years of my career in the former Soviet Union. Back home I thought I would land a reporting job easily; after all I spoke the language and knew the culture. What I had not anticipated was how difficult it would be to convince U.S. editors that writing about retired dancing bears in Bulgaria and mass graves in Ukraine really had prepared me to cover school board meetings and cop calls.

Smaller publications told me I would be “bored.” Larger ones said I needed “U.S. newsroom experience”.

Now, finally, I had good news.

“I found a job!” I told Dima.

“That’s great. Is it close to your mom and Trevor?”

Trevor was my British stepfather and Dima’s chosen western role model. I hadn’t had the heart to tell Dima earlier that I had slowly extended my job hunt from California to Washington State to Texas to pretty much anywhere in the U.S. that would offer me a reporting gig. That designation now included Arkansas and Kentucky.

“Well, not exactly,” I said. “It’s in Kentucky.”

I kept talking, hoping the words that followed would make him forget the Kentucky part.

“It’s a good job, a features position. They have a strong photo department. I talked to the photo editor and they might be able to use you as a photographer.”

He cut me off, “Kentucky?”

“Kentucky.”

We were both silent. There was a delay in the connection, which necessitated waiting several seconds after speaking in order to give the other person a chance to respond. The seconds stretched into a minute, then two.

A California native, I met Dima while living and reporting from Ukraine. I had made my way to the country via Latvia, where I took a job at an English language newspaper right after college. Following my experience in the Baltics, I decided to take a job at an English language newspaper in Ukraine, which is where I met Dima. Since we had been together I had taken him to visit family in the San Francisco Bay Area, London and Paris. Now I was asking him to relocate to Louisville, a city whose name I was still learning to pronounce, Loo-a-vul. I was grateful the job wasn’t in Versailles, I couldn’t imagine telling my French relatives I was living in Ver-say-elles.

My Parisian uncle had already warned me about the south, citing a visit he took to Virginia 30 years before, during which he got in trouble for kissing a girlfriend in public. My mother recommended I buff my nails because, “Women in the south care about those kinds of things.” She was one of the few members of my family who had actually lived in the South, having studied at Virginia Tech.

To Dima, anywhere in the U.S. that wasn’t New York or San Francisco didn’t exist. I tried to explain that I had chosen Kentucky for him, believing he would feel more at home there than in Arkansas. The truth was I was the one who had felt out of place while interviewing for a job in Arkansas.

Little Rock was one thing. Rural Arkansas was another. Yet that was the position I had talked the editor into considering me for, a job in a one-person bureau in a rural county where the last editor had either been shot at, run off, or had to wear a bulletproof vest to work. I no longer remember the exact details, but I know the circumstances were a bit more reminiscent of the unrest I had experienced in Kyiv than I cared to repeat.

***

I am not entirely sure what I was thinking when I applied for the position other than that I really, really needed a job. Touring the county, even the Little Rock crew I was with — Todd, the editor, and a young female reporter — seemed uncomfortable. We spent more time seeing the “sights” — long stretches of countryside dotted with trailers, satellite dishes and churches — than interacting with anyone.

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“It’s a dry county, that won’t be a problem for you, will it?” Todd asked.

Dry wasn’t the word I would have used to describe the lush landscape. Unsure how to respond I kept silent. Todd must have taken my silence for acceptance and continued talking.

“That’s good, some people really don’t like living in dry counties. I know it can be a bother having to go to another county to buy beer, but it’s doable.”

Dry counties, alcohol, the realization that he wasn’t talking about the weather — it all came to me slowly. Just as I was starting to catch on, Todd mentioned “moist counties”. The look of confusion on my face launched Todd into a tutorial on the various terminology surrounding the sale and consumption of alcohol. To make up for my ignorance I decided to mention my teetotalism credentials.

“Actually I don’t drink,” I said.

For good measure I threw Dima in as well. “My fiancé doesn’t drink either.” It was a strange quirk we shared, a lack of appreciation for the taste of alcohol.

“I thought he was Russian,” said Todd.

“Ukrainian,” I corrected.

“And he doesn’t drink?”

It was true, neither Dima nor I drank, but I realized too late that mentioning that Dima did not drink was not the best way to fit in. Not only did I have a Ukrainian fiancé, I had a Ukrainian fiancé who didn’t drink. Even in Arkansas it is common knowledge that Russians and Ukrainians drink.

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While interviewing in Kentucky I stayed away from the topic of alcohol entirely and instead decided to compare the state to Ukraine, a country most Americans equate with corruption and the collapse of the Soviet Union. The unfortunate comparison occurred to me when I was sitting in the office of one of half-dozen mid-level editors I was scheduled to interview with.

“You know Kentucky reminds me a bit of Ukraine,” I said.

When the editor didn’t answer I took it upon myself to explain.

“In Eastern Ukraine there are crumbling coal mines that are highly dangerous and poorly funded just like in Eastern Kentucky,” I said.

“Have you been to Eastern Kentucky?”

I replied in the negative and decided it was better not to question his Ukrainian credentials.

“I am not sure I would compare the mines of Appalachia to those of Ukraine,” he said.

I am pretty confident he has not had occasion to utter that sentence since.

***

Despite my blunders I ended up with two job offers, one from Arkansas and one from Kentucky. Rural Arkansas felt more foreign to me than Ukraine so I decided Louisville would be the better fit. I bought a car, rented an apartment and started work. I made friends with an intern — not a smart long-term move considering his time at the paper had a clear end date.— and got to know the photo department. I learned to say Loo-a-vul and the names of the past and present University of Louisville basketball coaches. Lord help the next newcomer who spells Denny Crum with a “b” at the end. I started wearing a lot of pink, a color that had never featured much in my wardrobe before but which seemed to be a bit of a staple for women where I now lived, or at least where I shopped.

It wasn’t just Kentucky that was new to me. This was my first full time writing job in the U.S. I had been warned about the stingy American vacation policy. In Ukraine, things were a bit more flexible. If you were sick you stayed home until you were well without worrying about how many sick days you had. When you wanted to take a vacation you asked for one, and your editor usually granted it. Paranoid that my early career abroad had set me behind, I made a point of showing up early on New Year’s Day. When the reporter who had been delegated holiday coverage for the day showed up an hour later she was as confused as I was.

“Why are you here?” she asked.

“Why isn’t anyone else here?” I replied.

The next day I found a printed copy of the official holiday schedule on my desk.

Outside of the office things were no easier. After hearing my name, people wanted to know where I was from. I am pretty sure they were expecting something exotic. California seemed to suffice, although it inevitably led to the follow up, “Why are you here?” and, “What does your family think about you being so far from home?” I wasn’t sure how to explain that my mother was thrilled to have me in the same country again with only a three-hour time zone difference and no language barriers, not to mention phone calls that did not include complimentary rudimentary wiretaps. But that got into talk of Ukraine, and Ukraine talk led to even more confusion.

For a community that identified people by where they went to high school, Dima and I were anomalies. In some ways more for me even than for him. To leave Ukraine for Kentucky made some sense. To leave California for Kentucky did not. Yet because I had not been back in California for long, it was as if I had left Ukraine for Kentucky as well. I remember talking with Dima about speeding tickets before his first U.S. visit. Dima drove fast in Kyiv. I warned him he would receive a ticket for speeding in the U.S.

“What is a speed limit?” he asked.

“It’s the speed you can’t go above or you will get a ticket.”

“A ticket?”

“Yeah, you have to pay money.”

“What if I offer to take the cop’s picture?”

When I explained that wouldn’t go over well, he asked if he could slip a little money with his license when he handed it to the cop. I don’t think he got it.

***

Strangely, it was not Dima who got in trouble with the cops in the U.S. but me. I was traveling in a rural region outside Louisville with a photographer named Pam. At a gas station Pam used a credit card to pay at the pump. Several miles later I noticed that we seemed to be passing a number of cop cars. A bit further along, one of the cop cars turned on their siren. I looked to see whom they were pulling over only to realize it was us. It turned out the pay-at-the-pump feature at that particular pump did not work, and we were now being stopped for not having paid for our gas.

“Please follow me back to the gas station,” said the cop.

We were already late for an important interview so I pulled a $20 from my wallet and tried to hand it to the officer.

“What are you doing?” the officer demanded, stepping back as if I was offering him leprosy, not money.

“We are really late,” I said. “Can you please just take the money and give it to the gas station attendant?”

Pam, a middle aged woman who had been raised on a farm, was too mortified to say a word. We traveled back to the gas station in silence.

Dima had it harder. When he told people he was from Ukraine there was often no follow-up question. Politeness outweighed curiosity. Although he could be charming when he needed to be, Dima could also be harsh. He described the locals as fat, ignorant, and lazy, and wanted to know when we would be visiting my family in California. I struggled to find something he would like, and settled on the world’s largest machine gun shoot.

***

I found the annual multi-day event fascinating and foreign. I didn’t really see the thrill in blasting machine guns into a large, open space, or shooting an Uzi at targets in a mock jungle, but Dima loved it. The flamethrowers that were fired at old appliances, the tracers that lit up the sky, the teenage girl who had near perfect aim with a pistol. Dima had finally found something he had in common with Kentuckians: a desire to blow things up.

The machine gun shoot was one of the few assignments we got to work on together. The newspaper used Dima as a freelancer, but when a full time position became available they didn’t offer it to him. Dima always sweet-talked the tough, bow-legged, alcoholic who gave out assignments, and his photos were beautiful — too beautiful. Later a friend told me that Dima wasn’t considered for the job because there was a suspicion he posed or manipulated his subjects. It was a habit that he had no doubt developed in Ukraine, where attitudes toward the truth were more flexible.

By then I had finally become friends with someone other than the intern. I didn’t exactly blend, but I had learned a few things about fitting in. I now knew that you could use and throw away the flower patterned paper hand towels left in restrooms, and that a “charger” was a completely unnecessary decorative plate that went under another plate.

I even made it to Eastern Kentucky while Dima was back in California for a visit. It was a work trip, and I traveled with Bill, a photographer from a county near the county we were visiting. When I got stuck in an interview, unable to understand the man’s thick accent and unfamiliar word choices, Bill stepped in to “translate”.

“Where you all from?” the source asked. The question was for both of us, but he was looking only at me.

I thought for a minute. Where was I from? I was born in California, had lived in Ukraine, and now called Louisville home.

“Loo-a-vul,” I said.

The man nodded. “Figures,” he said.

* * *

Katya Cengel’s memoir From Chernobyl with Love: Reporting from the Ruins of the Soviet Union is out now from Potomac Books. You can find her work for the New York Times Magazine, Marie Claire, and others at katyacengel.com and on Twitter at @kcengel.

Editor: Sari Botton