Post Office. Chapter II: 11
After nine or ten hours people began getting sleepy and falling into their cases, catching themselves just in time. We were working the zoned mail. If a letter read zone 28 you stuck it to hole no. 28. It was simple.
One big black guy leaped up and began swinging his arms to keep awake. He staggered about the floor.
“God damn! I can’t stand it!” he said.
And he was a big powerful brute. Using the same muscles over and over again was quite tiring. I ached all over. And at the end of the aisle stood a supervisor, another Stone, and he had this look on his face—they must practice it in front of mirrors, all the supervisors had this look on their faces—they looked at you as if you were a hunk of human shit. Yet they had come in through the same door. They had once been clerks or carriers. I couldn’t understand it. They were handpicked screws.
You had to keep one foot on the floor at all times. One notch up on the rest-bar. What they called a “rest-bar” was a little round cushion set up on a stilt. No talking allowed. Two 10 minute breaks in 8 hours. They wrote down the time when you left and the time when you came back. If you stayed 12 or 13 minutes, you heard about it.
But the pay was better than at the art store. And, I thought, I might get used to it.
I never got used to it.
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