Becoming a Community of Disciples

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Becoming a Community of Disciples

perhaps only three or four could fit on a semi-trailer. The finishing machines took these big rolls of paper and made other paper products. Not things like ruled notebook paper or envelopes, but thick paper stock products used in the backs of mirrors, in car doors and in hardback books, for example. Those rolls of paper were glued together by a machine called the laminator until they were the right thickness for whatever use they were bound and then cut to size by machines with ominous-sounding names, like “the slitter.” Though my dad worked different jobs at the plant over the decades, for most of my life he was a “pallet maker.” Though he no longer actually made the wooden pallets, he made sure the right pallets were at the right machines at the right times so that the finished products could be shipped to their final destination. So what made my dad a hard worker in this environment? Well, throughout most of my childhood and teenage years the plant was wildly successful, so much so that my dad worked seven days a week most weeks of the year. He would take a week or two of vacation in the summer, perhaps a week in the spring to do some spring cleaning around the house but otherwise my dad was at work. One week he worked the daylight shift (7 a.m. to 3 p.m.) and the next week he worked the evening shift (3 p.m. to 11 p.m.). Pallet makers did not have the miserable 11 p.m. to 7 a.m. shift but sometimes my dad would have to work late anyway. The paper and finishing machines ran 24/7 so he could not leave until everything was in order for those middle-of-the-night projects. In spite of all this, I do not recall my dad ever complaining. I am sure he did complain at times but I just do not remember it. Rather, my dad dutifully went to work, day in and day out, doing