Factories.... in Secrets from myself

I've spent most of my life working in factories - from age 19 to now when I'm 67.

I didn't intend to do that. I thought I would go to college and then write for a newspaper or a magazine or books even or maybe be an editor or teacher. I would have liked to teach highschool English or math, or maybe college courses.

My life changed when I was 14 and my mother died. She was the force behind my ambition and without her I drifted.

Now in the last quarter of my life, I don't regret my choice, or lack of choice. It's given me a more limited life than I would have had if I'd gone out into the world but it hasn't been a bad life. I value the way I've learned to look at things.

I like the gathering of resources it takes to make things. The people, the planning, the materials, the energy, the use of time. Let me make a list:

1. I worked on radio altimeters for a short time in a big important factory. They were intended to warn planes when they got too close to the ground. I was young and dumb and it was hot and I had to get up early, and they terminated me before my probationary period was up. then they rehired me to do office work at lower pay.

2. I worked at the main employer of my life for 33 years. It sounds like a long time doesn't it? A long time under the same metal roof with a lot of the same people. I raised my children and took care of my husband. For the first nine years I ran a punch press and cut out and formed pieces of metal that became calculator fronts and iron places and dials for auto dashboards and thermostat pieces and an infinity of other things. After that I went into the 'office' and did clerical and techy and customer relations things. They sent me to school and I traveled. I learned about Statistical Process Control and flow charts and control charts and control plans and Failure Modes Effects Analysis (FMEA), and R & R Studies, and computer stuff. I did dimensional layouts and figured out dbase and lotus. It was that long ago. I went to Matamoros and Princeton and St. Louis and Detroit. I stayed in nice hotels and rode the company jet. It was a long time ago too. The pilots were Speed and Comfort. That's a joke, but true just the same. Other people ran the punch presses when I did those things. I was expected to wear nice clothes and have clean fingernails. The travel and school part didn't last long. I was not executive material. I still worked in the office but corporate took over the perks. I did what I was told, and of course the plant went downhill for a lot of reasons. Partly it was the industrial cycle. Plants don't last forever. And partly it was the way the world is going. We have a global economy and we are skidding down to the lowest common denominator. That means fewer and fewer factories. Fewer of the kind who compete in the world market.

3. For three and a half years while working at the main job I had a part time job at the 'wire factory'. We made wire harnesses for tractors and other equipment. I worked in assembly and put the harnesses together, routing wires on boards and fitting them into connectors and testing them to be sure they were right and then taping them together so they had structure after they were removed from the boards. It was like doing crafts but not being responsible for buying materials or selling the finished product. It was fun except when it wasn't. Which of course is what work always is.

4. For the last four and a half years - since my main employer closed its doors - I've been working in a screen printing factory. For shorthand I say we make beer signs. We do make the graphics that go on the coolers made by our sister factory. We make signs too for other customers, state lotteries, auto parts stores, etc. Etc. is such a lame ending. I should quit using it.. I catch sheets, look for quality problems, clean equipment, mix ink, do some packing of product, etc. Lame as it is.

Working in a factory is not like writing for a newspaper or teaching high school. It's easier. Mostly easier. Sometimes it might be harder. I don't know for sure. You need to learn to manage time in your head for the boring parts. You need to give enough of your attention to the task at hand. You need to work well enough with your fellow workers to get by. You need to have another goal in mind.

Working in a factory does not require a nice wardrobe. Or super good people skills. It gives you a freedom that other jobs don't. It's a step up - generally - from minimum wage jobs and it's not the top of the heap for sure.

My main employer (#3) was a union shop - I belonged to the union until I went into the office. Iowa is a Right To Work state so employees are not required to join the union. I believe in unions. But if there is not one I'm ok too.

A union provides methods for communication between labor and management. Rules. Where I work now it's all more personal. That's neither good nor bad. It just is. This time of year they lay off the second shift. I worked second shift the first three years and got laid off. On my last night I asked the foreman if he ever thought of moving me to first shift so I wouldn't be laid off. I thought I was doing a good job. He said he didn't have a place for me on days. I said ok. After a month I got a call asking me to work days 'for three weeks'. I did and at the end of the three weeks they kept me on days. That is not how it would have worked in a union shop.

I didn't intend this to be about unions. I intended it to be about those metal buildings you see in industrial parks. I intended it to be about the people who work there, what they do, how they pass the days, how they earn their livings.

Maybe I'll have more to say next time. What would you like to hear?