During my teenage years, I had many summer jobs, some of which required extensive knowledge of a broom. Wearing a hard hat, safety glasses, and steel-toed boots, I was one of a few who swept the enormous factory floor of Combustion Engineering in Enterprise, Kansas, which manufactured power generation components. After graduating high school, I brushed up my broom skills even more as a part-time janitor at Garfield Elementary School.

Other distinguished jobs included drying dishes at the locally famous Lena’s restaurant, where General Ike and later President Ike Eisenhower once ate. It was here that a skunk indirectly sprayed me. As fate would have it, a poor unsuspecting skunk wandered onto Lena’s parking lot, and Walter, the dishwasher,

shot it with a .22 caliber rifle. The courageous skunk wasn’t going down without a fight and shot back before he perished. I felt bad for the smelly little guy who was minding his own business but just happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time. Life can really stink sometimes!

But he got his final revenge. We foolishly were just a tad too close and paid the price. The intense odor is similar to burning tires; it was almost suffocating. Of course, I high-tailed it home and jumped in the bathtub, which buffered it a bit, but it would take several more baths over the course of a few days to finally extinguish the overpowering skunk smell.

I also worked for an excavating company, where I couldn’t do anything right, causing the boss to constantly holler and curse at me, a farmer, where I practically died of a heat stroke in the blistering hot sun baling hay and pulling evergreen trees out of his pasture, an ice-dispensing company, where I was always freezing, and an alfalfa mill, where I worked long hours and drove a massive, heavy-duty alfalfa cutter.

During my junior year, I was looking for a summer job anywhere that I might earn enough money to keep my car fueled and pay for other necessities like beer!

I applied at a company in Solomon, Kansas, on Highway 40. Solomon is a tiny town with a population of around 900 and is about nine miles west of Abilene. It was the Solomon Hide Tanning Company, and they hired me on the spot. They knew a sucker when they saw one. What a delightful place! It was a large warehouse-like building painted a cheerful light blue next to the railroad tracks. While giving me the grand tour, the thoughtful interviewer asked me if I could handle the stench, which was disgusting, but I told him I think I could handle it. There were rows and rows of stacked cattle hides. I saw the workers standing next to the stacked hides, flipping them over and scraping a gooey, white substance off them. It looked gross, but I thought for the sake of beer money, I could contend with it. So, I decided to accept this prestigious job and was scheduled to begin the following Monday. Mom and Dad would be so proud of their son scraping white stuff off cowhides. What an achievement for their ambitious teenager. For some reason, they didn't seem as enthused as I thought they would.

Monday morning came, and I was off to Solomon for my first exciting day of tanning cowhides. What a thrill and honor.

One of the workers showed me the ropes: Turn over the hide, scrape off the white slimy fat, and throw a generous amount of salt on it. That sounds easy enough! I flipped over my first hide, a nauseating stench of rotting flesh enveloped me, and there were thousands, if not millions, of squirming maggots in the white fat.

Okay! This is going to be my best job ever!

One colleague brought me up to speed on maggots, explaining that there are several different types. The most intriguing is the amazing jumping maggot, even though it doesn't have legs. What will they think of next?

I couldn't believe my eyes at lunchtime. Most of my esteemed associates were eating their sandwiches among the squirming maggots, and the fresh stench of rotting flesh caused by the recently turned-over hides was the perfect ambiance for fine dining.

Since it was noon, I thought this would be the perfect time to take a breather from my new extraordinary job. I told my devoted colleagues I was leaving to go grab a bite. However, I was being dishonest and did something I probably wouldn't regret. That’s right, I left them high and dry. I didn't return! This was the one and only time I walked off a job. I drew a line in the fat! I decided maggots and rotting cow hides were a little too glamorous for me. I went home and took a long, hot bath to wash away the unforgettable fragrance of the Solomon Hide Tanning Company. ❦

No worries!

I’ve got a PhD in

Broomology.