First Day

First Day

I’d been assembling a lamp, my first day on the job, I’d been very clear about my skills, they didn’t blink. Apparently this job could be done by a fairly intelligent monkey.

It was exciting having a real job. I’d babysat, mowed lawn, errands. Did you notice I said mowed “lawn”? Only once. Having three brothers I never mowed our lawn. However, it looked pretty easy and I thought I could make some money. I underestimated the power of a lawn mower, and my ability to steer it…

Anyway, the lamp. I had a “work station” with everything I needed. Tools, the body of the lamp, the wires and plug, the part where you screw in the light bulb, a box of string tags, that had to attach to the top before I sent it on it’s way, and a box of soft circles, that go on the bottom after you put it all together. I had to put it all together. My “foreman” gave me a quick lesson, then, because it was so easy, he left me and went to check other things.

It went pretty fast, Jerry had told me that once I knew the job I would have a required number to make daily, but for today, to just get comfortable with the work. I did exactly what he’d showed me, sticking the circle perfectly on the bottom as my first lamp was done. The last step was to put in a bulb and plug it in to be sure it was correctly assembled.

There was a huge spark when I plugged it in. Immediately the entire building went dark and people started yelling everywhere. I never actually made it to my second lamp.

Apparently, I’m not as skilled as a fairly intelligent monkey… go figure!