When I was 20 years old, during the summer between my junior and senior years of college, I worked on a construction site in Grove City, Pennsylvania. We were building an addition to a General Electric manufacturing facility. I spent the days doing a variety of tasks as a general laborer. During one of those days I was tasked with removing concrete from around a steel column that had been set at the wrong height. It was a column intended to support a robotic inventory management system. We needed to re-set the column to the correct height. Unfortunately for me, one particular column was located in such a way that I couldn’t maneuver a jack hammer into place to break up the concrete holding the column. The only way to break up the concrete around the column was to use a sledge hammer to strike a long steel pin that was held by hand and wedged against the base of the column. It was my job to hold the steel pin, while another worker name Bill swung the hammer, hitting the pin with all his might. Bill was a large African American man who possessed strength that I’ve only observed in a few other men. Coupled with that strength, he owned cat-like coordination in all his limbs. As we got prepared to start our task of breaking up the concrete, Bill began to chuckle. He looked at me and said, “Are you ready?” I eyed him warily and said, “Yeah.” He set his feet, left foot forward, with the right foot slightly to the side and began to bring the large sledge hammer fully around in a wheel-house manner. His eyes were wide and a broad grin shaped his face. His face moved into a more mischievous smile as he began to say “Only hit a man once.” Thud/smash went the hammer against the steel pin I was holding with my gloved right hand. “Only hit a man once” Bill said again, with evident enjoyment as he continued to smile even more broadly. He did this again and again, four, five times. Finally the pin broke the concrete free. Bill, broke into a full-throated laugh at the look of terror on my face. He smiled and said “Killed him,” spun on his heels, dropped the sledge hammer and walked away shaking with laughter. I stood there frozen in place for what seemed like several minutes, recovering from the worry that I was about to lose my whole arm if he had missed the pin.
Todd Rivetti 