The Heat

Today was the hottest working day I can recall.  The high outside was 95 F, but inside the bakery, with all of the ovens going, it was oppressive.  There was sweat dripping off the faces of the bakers.  Changa, my assistant, was very crabby.  He laughed very few times and seemed annoyed at all of the tasks he needed to do, yet if he was not making pastry, he would have had to work on bread.  There was nothing to be done to cheer him up.  We did spend some time in the cooler as some of the pastries could not take the heat, so we brought them in the cooler to finish.  I also had him do some work packing cookies in the office.  This seemed to annoy the office manager, who is racist towards the Mexicans, but I did not care.  Bill sits in the air-conditioned office all day, staring at a computer screen.  He does not have to work in the stifling heat, lift 50 pound bags of flour, take hot pans out of 400 degree F ovens, so I do not care if he is put off.

There is something intimate about sharing these bewildering work conditions.  The faces we make at each other, the weary smiles.  It brings us closer.  It makes us one.