Windshields
Short Story
Christopher Girard
Out they rolled. One by one, car by car. Candy Reds, Aqua Blues, Canary Yellows. Out they rolled in perfect, showroom ready condition. Just one little problem, though, each and every car, had a cracked windshield. Yet, somehow, valiantly, they rolled off the conveyor belt into the yard , where they sat and waited. Patiently, silently they waited, they waited for George. They knew he would come, hell he always came, that was his job.
You see, George was a windshield fixer down at the plant. You would almost say that he was The Windshield Fixer. George was blue collar all the way boy, Iron City Beer and Pall Malls, capped with a Chevy truck for good measure, in case anyone was apt to get confused.
George wound his way through the lines of cars. George was patient, even a bit meticulous. Car by car, windshield by windshield, George went about his business with almost a Zen like precision and patience. Ole George had been doing this so long he could tell where he was in his work, by how the sun hit the yard. But, today was different. Today George felt tired, not just a physical tired but a deeper tired. A soul weariness a spiritual tired. Now, of course George didn't have the vocabulary to quite express this, but that doesn't mean he didn't know it. He had no parchment from some fancy school on the wall nor did he have a PHD from a major University, but George knew this tired better than most folk. You see George had, had the best teacher in the business, a real taskmaster, Experience. It don't come any better than that for learning the three R's.
As he wound his way toward the end of one of last row of cars, he passed close to the factory door. It was at this door that George seemed to pause. He stared inside the factory and something just seemed to hold his gaze there. Like a man trying to remember a name of a song, he just stared and rolled it around on the tongue of his mind. Before he knew exactly what he was doing George found himself in the factory hallways walking toward the assembly production line.. He walked further and further inside. He could hear the machinery at work. Producing, constantly producing, turning out units. "Got to make the daily quota, you betcha."
From one work area to the next George wandered. Seemingly without purpose but underneath, yeah underneath, he felt direction, guidance. At last he rounded a corner and could just see over the top of a crate. A crate filled with perfect, glinting windshields. He watched in fascination as a giant mechanical arm, swooped down and lifted a windshield out of the crate. Up it went with efficient ease and then aligned itself in position for the next waiting automobile. It was at this point, that the mechanical arm slammed the windshield into place with to much force onto the next automobile . It was here, at this point that the windshield cracked. It was here, that the real problem lay.
George just stared and laughed. A silent internal laugh. It was here you could say, that George once shared a laugh with God. After what seemed like hours, George finally picked up a wrench, tightened a bolt on the mechanical arm and watched with amazement as the next windshield was placed into position on the next car with a faint woosh. Perfectly placed, perfectly adjusted. Not a scratch or break.
George walked dreamily through the factory and out into the sunshine. George smiled and looked up and felt the sun on his face. Like a man released from prison, George finally felt free.
George was out of a job.
Are you running around fixing windshields today?
Windshields© COPYRIGHT 2005 Christopher Girard.
Reproduction prohibited without permission from the author.
07/26/05
