Hard Labor

Every year I sign-up to work in the cannery one day in the summer.  Actually it's only a four hour shift.  The cannery's open and running (on mostly volunteer labor) six days a week, but there is usually only one day in the summer when our stake has an assignment.  I like it because I don't have to take time off work, and because it's usually apricots or peaches.  (Once, back in '91, I did meat chunks.  I was pregnant at the time.  Never again.)  You work on the line with people of all ages and professions.  It makes you feel good to volunteer and do a service that is so necessary and appreciated.

You always make friends, but this time I went with a friend and we worked side-by-side.  No matter what job you're doing, the first hour always reminds you of the episode of I Love Lucy when she's working in a chocolate factory and can't keep up.  It always makes me laugh when we're so inept.  We were assigned part of the line where the cans are filled with apricots.  There were three of us (all elementary school teachers) who had to either knock a few apricots off, if the cans were overflowing, or put a few in, if the cans weren't full.  We either didn't have enough apricots, or our trough was overflowing.  It's really funny in a panicy sort of way.

After the first hour you get into a kind of groove, even if it's not very efficient.  You figure out a few tricks or some sort of system that half-way works.  By the third hour it's not near as funny.  You keep checking the clock.  You feel it in your feet, legs, back, neck, and head.  It's really noisy in there.  You're wet and sticky and sweaty.  When you leave, you're beat.  You have a whole new appreciation for people who do all kinds of manual or menial labor.  It's hard!

Just a side note - My favorite assignment is to be put on the machine where the apricots are sliced in half.  I always line up the crease in the fruit so it gets sliced there.  It really bugs me when I'm working some place else, and I see apricots that are cut every which way.  Next time I'm going to request that spot, and I'm going to train the others up to do it right.  Who wants to open a can of apricots that have been sliced willy-nilly?