Just Another Hot Night of Production

When I moved back to North Carolina in 1980 with my wife Terri after our family’s failed stab at running a farm in the Florida Panhandle, I decided I wanted to make things. So, I took a job at Carolina Extruded Plastics, working the production line on second shift. Plastic extrusion is like the old PlayDoh Fun Factory: you put a blob of PlayDoh in the machine and crank down on a lever, which forced the PlayDoh out of the front of the device where it would come out in whatever shape you wanted. I wrote a little poem about it.

Just Another Hot Night of Production

I am a gear
On the wheel of the
Industrial South
I am a tooth on a gear
On the wheel of the
Industrial South
I am a speck on a tooth on a gear
On the wheel of the
Industrial South