7:30 A.M., a
dark and cold winter morning and I’m
Already at
work. That’s when the day shift begins
At the
manufacturing plant where I work. It’s a
New year,
1968, and this is my first job since com-
pleting my
3-year enlistment in the Army. I now
Move parts
from one station to the next. Parts
Which have
been machined will now be welded
Together;
welded parts will move on to inspection;
Inspected
parts are accepted and ready for finish.
And so it
goes, round and round all day long. I ask
One of the
machinists about his work, and what is
That
complicated assembly he’s working on? It’s
A module
which will encase the cooling system for
An
astronaut’s backpack, he tells me. I am awestruck
And
impressed. The U.S. is scheduled to send men
To the Moon
before the decade’s end. This alien-
looking and
complicated piece with all its angles
And holes,
measured and machined to 1/1000th
Of an inch previsioned
accuracy could be part of
An
astronauts life-support system which will one
Day soon
land on the Moon. And I held it in my
Very own
hands, I, a twenty-year old nobody any-
body knows,
I, a common everyday blue-collar
Factory
worker in the Midwest who takes a bus
To work on
bitterly cold winter’s days, and who
Clocks-in
and begins his shift in the pre-dawn
Morning come
hell or high water, who push-carts
Everything
from raw material to finished goods all
Day long, I
will have held in my common-man hands
A finely
crafted and machined unit which may one day
Soon, with
the first of humanity, land on the Moon.
Why, the
very thought of it gives me gooseflesh. I’d
Best handle
this one very carefully. (Secretly, I’d like to
Etch my initials
into its surface.) Imagine, to the Moon!
Chris
Hanch 7-1-15
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