Unequal Equalibrium

When I was around the age of 10 or 11 my youngest brother, Ben and I had a contest to see who could spin around in a circle the longest. I don't remember who won the contest but I do remember that the time we spun around was greater than 10 minutes long. I also remember that after I couldn't spin any longer I laid on the ground holding my stomach as the room continued to spin around me for a very long time. I had a very similar experience like this today at the Cannery.

As a child, when living with my Grandma and Grandpa Gillmore, my Grandpa worked at the cannery and would bring home on occasion the large empty tin cans. He'd help us punch holes in either side, thread a string through them, and then use them as stilts. Besides just have fun walking around 8 inches taller, we'd often have races against each other on them. This simple tin can was a hit! But I never once did go to the cannery that he worked at. Today was the first time I had ever stepped foot into a cannery.

I have been wanting to go for a really long time, but was always quite intimidated by it because I had no idea how it all worked. When the sign up sheet went around a few weeks ago in Relief Society I let my intimidation get the best of me and I passed it right on by. Later I expressed my desire to go to the cannery to my roommate Krissy and she also said she was interested in going as well. It so happened that both our schedules worked out for us to go.

We showed up at the cannery this afternoon at the appointed time, both clueless. With nobody around we kind of guessed where we were supposed to go and what we were supposed to do. Finally somebody saw us and could tell we were a bit confused and directed to another part of the building where we were supposed to be. We went through the doors to the other part of the building and entered the production room. We stood around, again clueless until a kind gentleman saw us and had pity on us. He further directed us as to what we needed to do. Finally after getting all geared up in our hairnet, latex gloves, and plastic apron we were put to work on the Chicken Noodle Soup assembly line.

I was placed on a flate rotating table that had in the center of it a mixed pile of frozen carrots, celery, and chicken. Around the edge of this rotating table were round holes where 8oz tin cans were lined up beneath each hole. My job was to scoop a little more than 1/2 cup of the frozen mixture and place it in every third can. My two other fellow scoopers filled the other two cans I skipped. 1-2-3-pour. 1-2-3-pour. Pretty easy, no problem...until a couple minutes passed.

It was like I was jolted back in time to the spinning contest I had with my brother, but I wasn't the one spinning. I had to use all effort to not tip over from being dizzy. You would think after doing this for 4 hours your body would get used to the spinning. Nope. And even when the table stopped spinning it looked like and felt like it was spinning but in the other direction. It was really trippy. I didn't dare let go of that table once it stopped spinning until I was certain I wouldn't fall over. It didn't take me long for my equalibrium to balance itself out again. I am grateful that I didn't get the queasy, stomach-twisting feeling like I did in the spinning contest.

Besides the trippy dizzy experience, serving at the cannery was a fun experience. I thoroughly enjoyed it and look forward to the next time my ward has the opportunity to go and help out. It definitely was a learning experience as well. It was pretty amazing to go back into the warehouse section of the cannery and see all of the other packaged/canned food they had already done.

Another intimidating challenge crossed off my list. Sign me up again!