At the Father/Daughter Dance, a friend of mine and I were standing outside the gym talking to a third father about our jobs.

(This is not really a dance for fathers after and daughters about third grade or so. After that it’s really a Fathers Get Abandoned by Their Daughters and Go Play with Their Friends. Which is fine.)

My friend works in public service, too, but in the suburbs and in a way that is more street-level than mine. We’d both described our jobs as some variation of getting yelled at by people. His is more of that than mine is most days though that week I’d seen my fair share of it.

On some level, that’s the job. You’re trying to fix things (usually me) or keep bad things from happening (usually my friend) and people disagree with you so there’s yelling. Sometimes at yelling volume, sometimes not.

But then you leave work, come home, and there’s less yelling.

That’s because neither my friend nor I have our names on the door.

At some point, we decided it was OK to follow that person home and keep up the yelling there, too.

Look, like it or not, we’re public servants. So getting yelled at in public – maybe it’s in a meeting, a political event, or maybe it’s in a restaurant – goes along with the job. You’re being yelled at but they’re not yelling at you so much as they’re yelling at (or about) what you represent.

That third father at the dance? He kinda shook his head at me and my public sector friend as we were taking a break from wondering where our kids were inside a dark gym colored by the strains of Taylor Swift. I don’t think he saw the good that comes with the bad of a job like ours.

I remember having a disagreement with a former co-worker about the phrase “public servant.” He hated it. Didn’t care for being thought of as a servant to anyone. Or really having to explain himself to the public. He works in the private sector now but is still public-adjacent which I suppose is the best of both worlds but also I don’t think you learn as much.

If you can listen to what’s behind the words or talk to someone when they think no one’s watching them yell? You’re going to learn something.

The exchange has to happen in public though.

I don’t think I’d have been OK getting yelled at during the Father-Daughter Dance. Technically, it’s in public, but … less so. Mainly because there are other fathers and daughters there and they didn’t sign up for that.

Neither do neighbors. So it’s why the tactic of showing up at someone’s house to yell at them strikes me as particularly venal.

I’m all for protest. Uncomfortable protest. The societal pressure of public debate. But that’s what a public space is for.

Home is for rest. For a brief reprieve from the public. For television and birthday parties. For fathers and daughters.

Follow someone home? Keep up the yelling there? I’m not sure what that achieves other than hearing the sound of your own voice. That’s not a public debate, that’s a photo op.

And if you’re afraid of having that debate in public, well…maybe you’re not cut out for jobs like the kind me and my friend have.