“You know,” I said to my girlfriend, trying to sound as sexy as a man is able, “now I can say that I have showered with four women at once.”

 “Oh, shut up,” she said, half laughing, and then sprayed me with water.

 It was true, however.  At that moment there were three men and four women showering all together.  We were outside on the cement deck of a peach processing plant, in our swimsuits, washing the sticky, sweet peach slime off of our bodies.

 “We have been having to empty the septic tank pretty often,” Wally said, “so we have brought in a couple of outhouses.  We would also like you to shower on the deck, or only leave the water on to rinse when you take a shower.”

 The peach processing plant, being located in a small central California valley, was miles away from any sewage system.  It was pretty expensive to have someone come and empty the septic tank once a week.  The waste water from the processing plant, however, drained into a large swamp about one hundred feet away.  This meant that we were able to shower on the deck without having to worry about filling the septic tank.

 “Wally World” is the name we gave the plant. Of course, we stole it from National Lampoon’s, Vacation.  The place was really called, “Gleanings for the Hungry.”  It was a processing plant which dried peaches to send to hungry people throughout the world.  Wally (I cannot remember his last name) was the guy who built the place.  He was in his late fifties, with
a full head of gray hair, a light brown complexion, and very a friendly personality.  He used to be a top executive with Sears, making over a million dollars per year.  One day he saw a need and wanted to fill that need.  “There is an entire community that lives on the garbage dump in Manila in the Philippines.  Every day when the garbage trucks come, they scrounge through the newly-brought garbage to find their next meal.  These are some of the people we feed,” Wally said to us.

 “Americans are very picky,” he was telling us the day after we arrived.  “If a piece of fruit is not perfect, we will not buy it.  Most of the time this fruit goes to waste; it gets plowed back into the ground to serve as fertilizer.”  Gleanings are just that -- any kind of produce that is not perfect and therefore can not be sold.  Wally’s vision was to collect those gleanings to feed hungry people.  “My biggest competitors,” he said, “are places like Welches and Smuckers.  They use the fruit to make jelly and jam.”  He was a shrewd business man.  He had to be.  There was a lot of red tape to cut through to be sure that this fruit went to the people who needed it, rather than being sold by greedy government leaders.

 Wally World is in Sultana: the middle of an agricultural valley where the main crops were peaches and citrus.  Actually, the processing plant was built on a piece of land that used to be part of a huge grapefruit orchard, which still surrounded it.  The only source of entertainment was a McDonald’s a couple of towns away.

 We were a group of about twenty teenagers and six adults, who drove more than 16 hours in a three rental vans to get there.  I have to admit that we were a rowdy bunch who had almost no idea what we were going to be doing.  It was past midnight when we arrived, and as I opened the door of the van, the smell of fresh, ripe peaches floated through the air. It was a delicious smell.  Someone had been waiting up to greet us and we were quickly and quietly ushered into the bunk houses -- males in one, females in the other..  Actually, there was only one structure, with two separate rooms.

 Each of the bunk houses had eight sets of triple bunk beds.  There was a thin wall which almost divided the room in half, except for a six foot gap.  The bunk beds were in each corner and between them, against the wall, were wardrobes with a one foot square cubby hole and a one foot by four foot section for hanging things.  There was a very large, rusty metal fan hanging from the ceiling, almost completely clogged with lint.  It was blowing obnoxiously and rattling loudly.  The lowest bed in the bunks was on the ground and the upper bunk was a little too high.  One morning a guy sleeping on the top bunk was awakened suddenly and smacked his forehead against the light bulb on the ceiling.  I had wisely chosen not to sleep in a top bunk.  I was pretty tired and, after changing into my sleeping clothes, fell asleep quickly.

 We were able to sleep in that morning because it was Sunday.  No work was done on Sundays and breakfast was served an hour later.  After our breakfast, Wally took us on a tour of the place and explained the process, step by step.  The plant as a whole was pretty small.  It consisted of the bunk houses, a kitchen and dining room,  and two bathrooms. The outside walls consisted of sheet metal and the whole place was under one roof of the same material.  There was a large trough-like stainless steel sink and a mirror hanging on the wall above it in a passage-way between the bunk houses and kitchen.  I often shaved and washed up for lunch and dinner there.  The process line, also under the same roof, was just outside the dining room on a cement deck.

 Wally first took us to look at the huge wooden bins sitting outside in the sun. They held the peaches which most of the time had to be ripened two or three days before they could be processed.  He then took us to the process line.  The bins were brought over by a fork lift and a machine poured the peaches onto a conveyer belt.  The first station was quality control.  There were two decks about six feet from the ground so that, for the two people standing on each of them, the conveyer belt was waist high. These people would pull out the rotten peaches and throw them down a chute at their side.  The chute dropped them onto a different conveyer belt which carried the bad peaches to a garbage trailer, hitched to a tractor.  Once every couple of hours, this trailer would need to be emptied out in the field.

 The good peaches, however, were sent forward down the line.  They were then separated and dropped into one of two steel conveyer systems which had continuous sets of four round cups each with a hole in the middle.  The peaches fell into the cups and were moved along the line.  There were four people needed to work this station: one on each side of both lines.  Their job was to turn the peaches so that the side with the stem was facing up and the seam was parallel to the line.  This was to insure that at the next station, when they were cut in half, that they were cut at the best possible place.  The peaches were washed as they were cut.  This was probably more to keep the peach juice from sticking the blades together, as they separated to split the peaches apart after being cut.

 Once cut, the peaches were again joined into one group and sent down a kind of metal slide that looked like a large cheese grater.  When turned on, he explained, it shook violently, inching the peaches down.  The idea was to shake the pits out of the peaches and have them fall through the holes.  “It works pretty well with the big O’Henry peaches,” Wally said, “but not so well with the peaches we have now.”  At the end of this slide, the peaches landed on wooden pallets about six feet across by three feet wide, consisting of a frame and about ten wooden slats.  One person would stand on each side at the bottom of the slide to spread the peaches out evenly on the pallets.

 The next station was called cup-up.  The object was to turn the peaches so that the flesh of the peach was facing up.  If we could do this and still had time, we were supposed to try to pull out any peach pits.  At the end of the line, a machine would lift up the pallets and then stack them.  After twenty pallets had been accumulated, the stack was moved on.   About six to eight people worked this station, and the last two were supposed to stop the machine and reposition the pallets if it jammed.
 Each stack of pallets were driven by fork lift into one of the three sulfur houses.  These were brick buildings about six feet across, ten feet high and fifteen feet deep.  There were black canvas curtains covering the entrance of each one, which were pulled back for loading and unloading.  The sulfur houses then immersed the fruit in sulfur dioxide gas: a preservative.
 Sulfur dioxide gas works slowly and the peaches remained in the sulfur houses overnight. This process not only kept the fruit from going bad; it made the peaches soft and the pits were easier to remove.  Naturally, they all had to be removed before they could be dried out.  The people who were not working on the process line would be “pitting” the peaches.  Once all of the peaches for that day were processed, those who had worked on the line would then help pull out the pits.

 The pallets were brought out of the sulfur houses in stacks and set next to several of the large wooden bins, which were turned upside down to serve as tables. The pallets were then taken off of the stacks and placed on the improvised tables.  Once all of the pits had been removed, the pallets were then re-stacked. As a stack of twenty pallets stood about seven feet tall, it was a difficult task to unload the first few pallets and re-stack the last few.

 After the pits had been taken out, the new stacks of pallets were taken by a fork lift tractor to another section of the field  and laid out in the sun for several days to dry the peaches.  At the final station, the peaches were scraped off of the pallets with big spatulas that looked like the kind they have in pizza restaurants.  They then fell onto another conveyer belt which loaded the dried fruit into buckets.  The newly cleaned pallets were fed into the main processing line to be loaded up again.
 During the tour Wally showed us all of the emergency shutoff buttons and warned us about the safety hazards.  He ended it by saying, “I hope you all brought a pair of clothes that you can throw away at the end of the week.”  We were warned ahead of time and everyone had.

 In addition to the process line, there was a need for volunteers in the kitchen.  I think it was mostly women in the kitchen, not because we were sexist, but because they did not trust the men to cook.  These volunteers prepared our meals, cleaned up, and, while I hate to admit it, took some complaints -- quite ungracefully (for which I admired them).

 The next morning we were awakened at about 6:30.  One of the adults had gotten up earlier and began singing. I do not remember the song, but his daughters told me that it was the same song he used to use to get them up.  Breakfast was at 7:00 and the work began at 8:00.  I have never been an early riser and stayed in bed until the very last minute.  Finally, I threw on some clothes and went in to eat.  It was a small dining room with about fourteen tables crowded into it.  The tables were pushed against the walls, forming a center aisle and several aisles where the chairs were placed.  Each table was covered with those vinyl red and white checkered tablecloths that reminded me of an outdoor picnic.  At the far end of the room was the serving window, and the line stretched nearly to the door.

 I sat down and waited for everyone to get in line.  I then took my place at the end.  I do not know exactly why, but I always enjoyed being the last one in line.  I hated seeming greedy.  We were all a team, there for a common purpose.  It seemed to me that competing for a place in line lacked that team spirit.  Of course, one of the adults, Gray, would sometimes wrestle me playfully to be the last one in line.

 Our breakfast consisted of cereal, scrambled eggs, toast, juice and coffee.  Naturally, there was a big bowl of peaches sitting on the counter as well.  Breakfast lasted about 30 minutes, and then everyone had the rest of the hour to prepare for the day.  I usually spent that time talking with others, and waited until the last minute to change into my throw away clothes.
 Because it was the first day of work, we all gathered around the base of the quality control deck.  Wally was standing on the second rung of the ladder so he could speak to everyone.  He was giving out assignments.

 “I need a couple of tall people to work at cup-up, since shorter people have a hard time getting the ones in the back,” Wally said.
 
No one raised a hand.  I did not really want to work at that station, but I had come there to do whatever I could.  I wanted to make someone’s day a little better, and, being one of the tallest in the group, this was my chance.  I raised my hand.

 “Your name is. . . ?” Wally asked.

 “James.”

 “Okay, who else wants to work with James?” he asked.

 A few more hands raised and soon that station was filled.  One by one, all of the assignments were given out and the processing was ready to begin.  We had twenty bins of peaches to process that day.  I proceeded to the cup-up area, and took my position toward the first part of the line.  The machines were turned on in succession.  I was not ready for the noise: all the squeaking, banging and rattling.  A friend tried to say something to me, but I had to move in close and have her repeat it.  Only a few minutes later, I watched the peaches pour from the big wooden bins onto the first conveyer belt.  About a minute after that I started working.

 At first, as with most new jobs, I was full of energy.  I worked quickly and nimbly.  I was fast enough that I was able to get many of the peach pits out before the pallets passed me along the line.  After a couple of hours, my back hurt from constantly bending over and my fingers were numb and raw with the pain of all the sharp edges on the peach pits.  I moved a little more slowly, but I made sure that I was doing as much as I could.  My clothes were already in sad shape, stained with the slimy nectar of the peaches.  As I watched my  fellow workers stretch, rub their backs and fingers, and wipe the goo from their faces, I knew that I was not the only one feeling the pain.

 The pain, however, was stifled.  When I looked into their faces, I saw a glow.  Their eyes lit up with pleasure.  I felt it too.  I was happy to be there.  I was proud of myself.  A feeling of satisfaction welled up within me.  I knew that, with each peach I overturned, someone would have something to eat that did not come from a garbage pile.  It was that feeling, that satisfaction, which drove me to keep working.

 Before I knew it, lunch was ready.  Word was given and the last bin of peaches was processed.  As the peaches went through each stage, people began leaving their posts and shutting down their machines.  It grew quieter and quieter.  Being last on the line, we were the last workers to leave for lunch.  Once the last of the peaches had been loaded onto a pallet and turned over, we, too, left for lunch.  Actually, most of us first gathered around the large sink to wash our hands, arms, and faces.  Once washed up, I put on a different set of clothes, hanging my dirty ones on a rough two by four banister outside the bunk house.

 Lunch lasted an hour and it went by too quickly.  I changed back into my work clothes, once again stationed at cup-up.  The supply of peaches only lasted a couple more hours, and my back was grateful.  There were more bins out in the yard, but they were not ripe enough to be processed.  Again, I watched as the last load of peaches went through the line, until all of the peaches were loaded up and the last pallet put on top of the stack.  Again, the place grew quiet, except for the conveyer belt going to the dump trailer.  Shovels were brought out and a few people began shoveling peaches from the ground onto the running belt.  I helped out, picking up the rotten fruit with my hands.  Once all of the fallen peaches were cleaned up, the hose was brought out and all the machines were hosed down.  Finally the cement was hosed off, and a high pressure water sprayer was brought out to get all of the sugar from the peaches off of the cement.

 Though the cleanup was nearly finished, our work was not yet done.  They had processed over forty bins of peaches on Saturday, and had only begun to take the pits out.  Up until this time, there had only been a group of about five people doing this task.  Now there were almost thirty.  Five of the make-shift tables were set up, and soon I was pulling pits out with both hands.  We had buckets on the ground next to us.  I pulled out as many pits as each hand could hold, then tossed them into the bucket.  I repeated this process; again and again and again and again.  We soon began telling jokes, riddles, stories, and singing songs -- anything to pass the time.  We made up knock-offs of beach boys songs with lyrics like, “If everybody had an orchard, across the USA, then everybody be pittin’ those peaches all day.”

 It was not long before my fingers were completely raw.  The sulfur dioxide caused me to have coughing fits.  Several people tried taping their fingers and wearing some kind of face mask.  That did not last very long.  While pulling out the pits, I again paused for a moment, watching my fellow workers.  There was not a frown on any of them.  There was a sense of happiness, or perhaps fulfilled purpose, that ran through the entire area.  It ran through me.  It was the knowledge that this meant something more than money.

 “James!” Gray said playfully, waking me from my meditation, “Back to work!”  I turned to see the flesh of a peach splatter on my forehead and then drip down my face.  The next thing I knew we were wrestling each other; I was trying to fill his beard with the slimy goo and he was attacking my hair.  Several people joined in, and it was pure chaos for a minute.  Those who were not covered with sticky peach slime stood laughing at us.  Of course, they did not stay clean very much longer.

 We kept working until dinner, still not finished pitting all of the peaches.  We went back to work afterwards and it was past eight o’clock when the last pallet was re-stacked.  I stretched, yawned, and rubbed my aching back.  I was still pretty slimy.  I hung out my clothes, put on my swimsuit, and headed out for a shower.  The water was cold, but my desire to be clean made it bearable.  I went to sleep easily that night.  I knew I had done something good that day.

 The rest of the week progressed similarly.  We had a couple of lean days, in terms of the amount of peaches that had to be processed.  We spent those days washing the fermented cherry juice out of donated buckets so that we could pack them with peaches.  Whatever the work, we did it cheerfully.  Near the end of the week, when those in our group were starting to feel the wear of the labor, one girl said to me, “I am so tired of pulling these pits out!”  I replied, “I know.  So am I.  But I have to stop myself and imagine a hungry child, living on a garbage dump, eating that peach with a smile.  That’s what gives me strength to go on.”  Her spirits were lifted.

 We left that week, a little sad to go, but satisfied that we had worked hard for a good cause.  The next three summers, we made the pilgrimage back to Wally World.  The facilities improved: a sewage system was installed, more showers were added, dormitory rooms were built, and even a pool was installed.  Our purpose never changed, and I never felt as good as when I was explaining to someone, a few weeks later,  that sulfur dioxide had caused the skin on my hands to turn brown and start peeling off.

 I want to go back!
 

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