“Don’t cry because it’s over. Smile because it happened.” – Theodor Seuss Geisel

“Good morning for the last time,” said my supervisor. It was the beginning of our shift meeting on December 23, 2009 and he was standing at the front of the break room. He glanced up from his clipboard. “Good luck to all of you with your future plans.”

I looked around the room. We were a small, but diverse group of people with diverse plans. Most of us were going to work for Victor Manufacturing (the plant Benco was merging with) after the first of the year. Some of us were going to retire. Some of us were planning to go back to school and begin new careers. And then, there were those of us (myself included) who didn’t really know what the heck they were going to do. One thing was certain for all of us, though:

This was our last day as Benco employees.

Except for the radio blaring God Bless the Broken Road over the PA system, the plant was nearly silent. As I made my way across the factory floor to my job for the day, I couldn’t help but notice big swaths of empty floor space, that, just a few short weeks earlier, were filled with machinery and people. Most all the important equipment and quite a few people had already been transferred on. It wasn’t too many years ago, I thought, when nearly 300 people worked in this building. Now, on this last day, there was only a handful.

It was 1989 and I was only 18 years old when Benco (part of Magna International) hired me as a production worker. My orientation tour was quite an eye-opening experience. Gary showed me the hydraulic area. The machines resembled miniature jungle gyms, only with complicated arrays of hydraulic cylinders and hoses sticking out of them. They hissed, clunked, and rattled as they formed metal tubing. Making oil strainer tubes for the auto industry was the plant’s specialty. Nearby, operators kept the temperamental machines running.

Another aisle revealed the blanking area. BANG BANG BANG… A row of presses banged away, forming (blanking) out component parts that would later be assembled into larger, more complicated finished products. Other areas of the plant revealed the spot welders, ovens, and repo.

Of course, I didn’t understand everything Gary was talking about. He was speaking in the grand, unique language of Benco Manufacturing. Although I wasn’t exactly the “shiniest garnish in the tote,” a few short weeks later I began to be able to tell the difference between the Ford, GM, and Chrysler products.

Fork trucks zoomed back and forth across the factory floor. I could smell diesel smoke as a semi-truck pulled out of the shipping area. All in all, the factory was a busy, noisy, dirty, sometimes confusing place (especially for a new guy like me). But, as time went on, I realized it wasn’t such a bad place to work.

Despite this, throughout the years I recognized the quitting time buzzer to be the sweetest sound in the factory. I have to admit that today, this last day, was no exception. I logged out of my machine, shook a few hands, and then I left. As I walked out to my car, I thought, well, that’s it. I said my last good-byes. But, as I put it in gear and drove out of the parking lot for the last time,

I said it one more time.