The Potatoland Diaries - Chapter 6

DAY 5 — March 28, 2007

"Russet stampede"
My sister, Shawna, thought that potato sorting sounded fun and interesting.

I knew that Jim was looking for more people, since Maureen would be in South Dakota visiting her grandkids during the week that we were going to have to sort "those big russets," an event to which Jim referred in a tone that made it sound like russets were something you might release, red-eyed and snorting with fury, from a heavily reinforced corral. So I asked him if he wanted me to bring my sister, and he said yes.

I had some fun, after that, dreaming up what to tell Shawna she needed to bring.

"Obviously, bring your cutlass. They get dull after awhile, so it might be good to bring two..." I mused.

But you have to get up pretty early in the morning to fool Shawna, so I gave up on the idea of trying to dupe her into coming dressed in pirate attire.

I did tell her to bring gloves and goggles. Her imagination had already supplied the rest of her ensemble: The worn (but clean) calico frock, topped off by a pair of men's overalls... The dotted kerchief tied over her curls, with one or two locks venturing out to cling to her careworn cheek... And, of course, the ubiquitous homemade Karo tin lunch pail with the wax paper-wrapped sandwiches.

We met in Border's parking lot at 8, and she actually was wearing overalls, I think, but the rest of the agreed-upon vision was only imagined. She had a shopping bag lunch, and from the loaf of bread and jar of peanut butter peeking out, I could see we belonged to the same school of lunch preparation.

It was cold, with flakes of snow blowing in a northeast wind. The russets were stomping and kicking up dust. Our task was to sort for rot, misshapen potatoes, rocks, clods... Oh, and to remove every potato that was larger than 10 ounces, which turned out to be nearly all of them.

My memory blurs. I don't even remember who pushed the green button on the conveyor that first time. But somehow, 500,000 potatoes came thundering off the rollers, choking us with dust. Our arms moved in fast motion, just like in that "I Love Lucy" episode that I have often used as an example of what my perfect job might be. But Lucy got to eat the chocolates. Those big, dirty russets didn't hold quite the same appeal.

It was probably pretty disappointing for Shawna that we didn't get to sing the banana boat song with substituted potato lyrics as she had imagined. She was too busy grabbing oversized spuds off those rollers to look up, or think. They went by so fast, it was like trying to empty a river with a tablespoon.

When, finally, the last potato rolled into the last truck, Shawna went into the break shed to fill out a W-4 form, so she would get paid for her day's work. The day probably equaled about an hour and a half of her professional wage as a technical writer. And it certainly won't be enough to cover the massage work it is going to take to erase the memory of the russet stampede.