I take the job because it pays $3.00 an hour and I haven't worked in months.There is a new baby in the house. It will give me something to do until my ship comes in, tugged off a shoal and cast out to sea. I'll get up and help my wife feed the baby. II will be late night-shift work. I don't care. Boredom breeds danger. It is close by and close to a MacDonald's faux-restaurant for the 30 minutes I get for lunch. Screw my arteries.
The extruder oozes plastic cum for dimestore childrens' toys. I learn the trick of industrial sabotage from the foreman, who makes $4.50 an hour. No benefits, of course. The foreman is a good guy who hates the place too. Accidentally open the door to the extruder, he whispers. Alarms will go off. The machine will stop spurting. You're getting paid for downtime anyway. Technicians will have to reset it. Reset could take half an hour. Nothing to do. Go outside with machine coffee and smoke. On a hot night even the ooze of humidity is refreshing. Forget the insult of this work. Forget there is no future except moving in with my in-laws, 110 miles from New York.
In the morning I sit with my wife in the kitchen. We feed the baby his bottle and Gerber fruit. I hold him so he can spit up on my shoulder. My wife looks at me. "You're going to quit, aren't you?" I nod, call the shop, and tell them I'm not coming back. Oh well.
A few weeks later my ship comes it. It is the Lusitania, so I find out. For three years I live with a target below the waterline, but the work pays better than $3.00 an hour. I can get used to fear of death by water because that's why they pay me.
KTW, 8-28-12
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