The factory closed on a Thursday. This is not significant. Factories close on any day of the week. But it felt like a Friday anyway, because when the doors locked at 5 PM on a Thursday, it was clear that nobody would be coming back on Monday.

I was forty-four. I had worked at the plant for twenty-two years. I had started at twenty-two, right out of high school, with a pair of work boots and a handshake and a belief in the word steady. The word steady had been a lie. But I had believed it anyway. Believing is not a sign of stupidity. It's a sign of hope. And hope is not a moral failing.

I applied at the on Route 6. They hired me. I was a crew member. My job was to assemble burgers and hand them through a window to people who were driving past each other at forty miles an hour, too busy to eat and too hungry to do anything about it. The manager was a woman named Linda who had been in her forties for as long as I'd known her and would be in her forties for as long as she lived. She told me the rules: don't steal, don't talk to customers, keep the fryer clean. I followed the rules. I was good at following rules.

I was there for three months. Three months of standing in a room that smelled of old oil and old grease and old decisions, assembling burgers for people who did not look at me, did not thank me, did not see me. I made $7.25 an hour. The commute was forty minutes each way. I lost twelve pounds. I gained nothing.

I left. Not because I wanted to. Because Linda called me one morning and said, "Ray, we don't need you anymore. Someone left early twice this week. We can't do that." I said, "I'm sorry." She said, "Don't be sorry. Be somebody."

I found a job at a gas station outside of Cleveland. The owner was a man named Gene who was older than I expected to be when I grew up, which was to say he was older than I expected now, which was to say he was ancient. He had a radio that played country music and a cup of coffee that was always warm and a ledger that he updated every evening with a pen that leaked ink. My job was to pump gas and check oil and occasionally sweep the forecourt. I pumped gas. I checked oil. I swept the forecourt. The rain came. The sun came. The cars came. I pumped gas and checked oil and swept the forecourt.

I was there for four months. I left because Gene told me to. Not because I had done anything wrong. Because his nephew needed a job. "Family first," Gene said. He was not angry. He was matter-of-fact. He was the kind of man who accepted the world exactly as it was and asked nothing more of it.

I left Cleveland. I drove west. I found a job at a warehouse. I loaded trucks. I unloaded trucks. I moved boxes from one side of a room to another side of a room and then from that side back to this side. The foreman was a man named Carlos who spoke English and Spanish with equal fluency and a weariness that seemed to belong to both languages equally. He told me, "You work hard, Ray. You're good at this." I said, "Thank you." He said, "It doesn't matter." He was not being cruel. He was being honest. And honesty, in a warehouse at 6 AM, is indistinguishable from cruelty.

I worked there for six months. The warehouse closed. It was restructured. They said it was for efficiency. I think it was for something simpler. The people who made the decision did not know my name. I did not know their names. We were connected by nothing except a piece of paper that said I would receive a check every two weeks and a piece of paper that said they would sign it.

I have worked at five different jobs in the last two years. I have met thirty-seven different people. I have learned thirty-seven different ways to do nothing that matters. I have learned that there is no ladder. There is only the ground and the thing you are carrying and the next step.

I am carrying a box. The box is heavy. I will set it down. I will pick up another box. I will carry it somewhere. I will set it down.

This is not a tragedy. This is not a comedy. This is not a story. This is a man carrying boxes.

But.

The boxes are heavy, and the ground is hard, and the next step is always the one you take. And I take it. I always take it. This is not hope. This is not resignation. This is simply what a man does when there is nothing else to do.

I carry the box.

OTMES-v2 Code: OTMES-v2-D2082BA6-650-M3-270-4R1000-CF40