This summer I was working down at the fish plant for a lousy $7.50 an hour. The most memorable opening was the first twelve hour opening because there were a lot of fish. Our job was to unload the fish out of the fishing boats with a large crane which was operated by our boss Nick Duny. We had to throw the fish into the metal boxes and then fill them with ice. After a while working with this process, it got a little slower and my back was starting to get tired. Soon it came to the point where minutes were feeling like hours and the fish were as heavy as elephants. As I was working I was beginning to ask myself if I was working too hard for this amount of money. When I got too tired I would go to Nick Duny and ask him if I could use the forklift to haul the metal boxes of fish to a decent spot so they wouldn't be in the way. We would take turns using the forklift and impatiently wait for our own turn so we could rest. We would also look at the long line of boats which meant an average of about two totes per boat. We would stare at the line exhausted and often cussing silently inside ourselves.

Finally when there were less boats a sigh of relief came from all of us who worked unloading the fish. Then more boats would come in and we would get mad and complain to ourselves. We would peek at the boats every once in a while wishing there was another place to sell the fish so we could be done faster.

Finally we were on the last boat. We took our time unloading because there were no more boats after this. Then we iced up the fish again and loaded them on the Kathleen and the Kimberly Ann. It wasn't much more of a picnic than loading fish into the metal boxes.

Finally, we were all done after spending an eternal eleven hours at the fish plant. The next challenge ahead of me was to walk all the way up to my house without dropping from exhaustion.

By: Chris Fitka