Labor Day Is Not a Mattress Sale

Labor Day is one of those holidays that somehow got buried under long weekend cookouts, back-to-school exhaustion, and retail ads screaming about discounts on appliances large enough to require their own ZIP code. I am not against a good sale. If somebody wants to celebrate the American worker by reducing the price of a refrigerator, I will not stand in the way of democracy. But Labor Day should mean more than charcoal, clearance racks, and pretending summer has not already packed its bags.

At its heart, Labor Day is about the people who do the work. Not the people who talk about work in boardrooms while pointing at charts. Not the people who create slogans about productivity from chairs that cost more than my first car. I mean the people who actually keep the country moving every single day, often without applause, recognition, or anyone saying, “You know what, without you this whole thing collapses faster than a house of cards.”

Think about the trades. Electricians, plumbers, HVAC technicians. The welders, carpenters, mechanics, roofers, construction workers, pipefitters, masons, and every other skilled worker who knows how to fix, or build, or install, or repair. These are the people who rescue the rest of us from our own helplessness. These are the people we suddenly appreciate very deeply when the air conditioner quits in August or the toilet turns the bathroom into an indoor swimming pool complete with working fountain and floaties.

The trades do not get enough respect. That is the blunt truth. We spent years telling kids that success had to look like a four-year degree, an office job, and a laptop bag. Meanwhile, the country still needs people who can wire a house, weld a frame, repair an engine, install a furnace or build a wall. We need them to climb onto a roof so that people like me will not become the latest casualty on the block. Skilled labor is not a backup plan. It is essential work that requires intelligence, discipline, training, and the ability to solve real problems in the real world.

That is one reason I created the Trade Apprentice Series. I wanted to build practical notebooks for people who are learning serious skills. Apprentices are not just filling out time. They are building futures, learning trades, and preparing to become the people the rest of us will desperately call when something breaks.

Labor Day should also recognize another kind of labor that often gets overlooked: creative labor. Writers, independent publishers, editors, illustrators, designers, researchers, and small creators add more to daily life than people realize. We educate, entertain, organize, distract, comfort, challenge, and occasionally give readers something to do besides doom-scroll until their eyes file a complaint.

Independent publishers and writers work across every format and genre imaginable. Some create novels that help people escape for a while. Some write children’s books that make learning fun. Others create journals, activity books, devotionals, or how-to resources. Niche titles serve communities too specific for giant publishers to bother with. That work matters, even if it usually happens quietly at a desk covered in a deeply judgmental pile of unfinished ideas.

Creative work is still work. That seems obvious, but apparently it needs repeating because some people think writing is just “typing your thoughts” and publishing is just “putting it online.” That is adorable. Wrong, but adorable.

Writing, editing, designing, formatting, marketing, publishing, revising, and promoting all take time, skill, patience, and the ability to continue functioning after a file refuses to upload for no reason known to science. It also takes a thick skin and a high tolerance for caffeine.

Labor comes in many forms. Some workers carry tool belts. Others carry notebooks. Some drive trucks, stock shelves, or teach classrooms. Some labor is loud. Some is quiet. Some is physical. Some is creative.

This Labor Day, I hope we remember the real meaning behind the holiday. It is not just a day off. It is a reminder that nearly everything we depend on exists because somebody worked or showed up when it mattered.

So thank the people who labor for you every day and also all the workers you may never meet but rely on anyway.

Who do you want to thank this Labor Day?