Blood
There's blood on this keyboard. A little red stain gets added every time one of my fingers jabs on a key. My fingers are a little torn from the new job.
All afternoon, I get boxes filled with product, break them open, and put the new stock on the shelves. If the stock has a best by date, I pull all the old out and put the new in the back, otherwise I push the old to the back and put the new out front. Simple.
The tricky part is breaking the boxes. Most of them, you use a box cutter and voilà, stock is ready to go. But some of the boxes have a little symbol of a box cutter with a line through it, some of the boxes have no tape. Those boxes, those boxes you jab your fingers into them, into the dark insides, grip, and you rip them open. But at that moment when your hand goes in blindly, it's like when you were a kid at Halloween parties, putting your hands into a bag of peeled grapes or cold cooked spaghetti, except instead of wincing at the eyeballs or the intestines, you get a sharp intake of breath as a box corner digs into your finger, or your finger hits something solid and the skin that holds your nail to your finger tears.
The evening, after supper, we face. If anyone ever tells you they know what facing is, feel sorry for them. Realize that they've done something you are ecstatic you've never done. Facing.
Ever been to the grocery store, looked down the aisle and noticed that every thing was fully in stock and all the labels were facing out? Well, they aren't fully in stock. After people bought product, an employee went over and faced. They pulled the product from the back of the shelf to the front, and then turned it so it was label out. Ever notice how long an aisle is in those grocery stores. Ever think about how many shelves there are? How many products there are? Every single one of them needs to be faced. Every single one of them.
And that's it. That could be my day every day. No variety. No change. If I want it it's there. And eventually, after working it long enough, my fingers would get used to it. There wouldn't be pain every time I stab my fingers into a box blindly. I wouldn't leave little red splotches on product labels. There wouldn't be any more blood.
All afternoon, I get boxes filled with product, break them open, and put the new stock on the shelves. If the stock has a best by date, I pull all the old out and put the new in the back, otherwise I push the old to the back and put the new out front. Simple.
The tricky part is breaking the boxes. Most of them, you use a box cutter and voilà, stock is ready to go. But some of the boxes have a little symbol of a box cutter with a line through it, some of the boxes have no tape. Those boxes, those boxes you jab your fingers into them, into the dark insides, grip, and you rip them open. But at that moment when your hand goes in blindly, it's like when you were a kid at Halloween parties, putting your hands into a bag of peeled grapes or cold cooked spaghetti, except instead of wincing at the eyeballs or the intestines, you get a sharp intake of breath as a box corner digs into your finger, or your finger hits something solid and the skin that holds your nail to your finger tears.
The evening, after supper, we face. If anyone ever tells you they know what facing is, feel sorry for them. Realize that they've done something you are ecstatic you've never done. Facing.
Ever been to the grocery store, looked down the aisle and noticed that every thing was fully in stock and all the labels were facing out? Well, they aren't fully in stock. After people bought product, an employee went over and faced. They pulled the product from the back of the shelf to the front, and then turned it so it was label out. Ever notice how long an aisle is in those grocery stores. Ever think about how many shelves there are? How many products there are? Every single one of them needs to be faced. Every single one of them.
And that's it. That could be my day every day. No variety. No change. If I want it it's there. And eventually, after working it long enough, my fingers would get used to it. There wouldn't be pain every time I stab my fingers into a box blindly. I wouldn't leave little red splotches on product labels. There wouldn't be any more blood.
posted by christopher hearns at 7.10.07
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home