Desk Jockey

This past week I covered for my mom by trying to partially fill her shoes as the desk jockey for Virginia Vermiculite, a vermiculite mine in Green Springs, Virginia. Vermiculite is a gold shiny mineral that is mined open-pit style in the rolling green hills among the big historic farms of western Louisa County. From the road there are no clues - just a sign saying "industrial intersection" and a well used gravel driveway.

Vermiculite is moved around with heavy equipment, and sent to the plant to be washed and separated in a liquid shaking thing, and put in big piles, hoppers, or bags. Vermiculite comes in different size grades (4, 5, 45, & 54), and can be expanded by heat (called popping), they do some, some companies do it themselves.

Vermiculite is not a common mineral. There is only one other mine in the US and not many worldwide. VAVerm is at its second location (next door) and recently received a national reclamation award for its reclamation of the former site - it now looks just like all the other farms in the area and is protected under historic easement. Vermiculite is a mineral so it is naturally flame-retardant and is used in wall-board and is also used in potting soils. I am sure there other uses, but those are the big ones I know of.

The office is in a old farmhouse that was on the property. It was moved, and I am not sure what its later function will be, but there is old furniture in good condition in the unused rooms upstairs. My mom's desk fills the foyer and is the first thing you encounter once you enter the front door. From her desk you can see the big piles of slag rock pulled out from mining, the truck scale, the vermiculite storage barn, and a corner of the plant.

I am not sure what my mom's exact title is, but I do know that she is difficult to replace. She is the only one who needs a replacement when she goes on vacation, and like all others who fill secretary shoes, is probably the only one who knows all the ins and outs of everything besides the boss. She answers the phone and emails and faxes and mail, runs the reports, pays the bills, does the payroll, weighs the trucks in and out, makes copies, files, and probably a million other things. Replacing her is out of the question.

My role as desk jockey was to answer the phone and direct calls, though I did answer some calls directly, weigh trucks in and out and do their paperwork, record upcoming orders and file them, and sit at the desk. I also did some odd jobs like copying, sorting, and filing.

Sounds easy... except there are so many exceptions and little bits of minutiae to remember. There are at least 8 companies picking up material - and some of those companies have at least 8 locations. Different companies and locations get different grades of material, but the drivers probably do not know. Trucks can be pneumatic, flatbeds, or trailers - trailers that load from the end and ones that load over the top. A lot of the truck drivers have never been to VaVerm and do not know where to go (and I hardly know). I actually had one stop in the office to ask what exactly they were hauling and what it was used for. The trucks cannot go over 80,000 pounds, but probably get paid more for the weight they haul - so some weigh and go get more, and some weigh and have to go unload. And some have to do both. Sometimes there are three or four trucks in at a time so I had to know which truck was which to weigh them out with the correct ticket. I tried to do this with color, but there are lots of red and white trucks. Some have CBs, some don't and some that have them you cannot understand at all. 

I am not cut out for being chained to a desk. I do not like sitting still for that long and you can't really move too much because what if the phone rings? I did use that forced sit down time to work on school work for my entomology class and listened to lectures (with lots of pausing), wrote a paper, and prepared for a practical exam. I also wrote a few blogs, checked my email, and read some news. I guess I would have brought a book if I didn't have school work to do. The other thing that was hard was the desire to eat ALL THE TIME. I guess it was boredom and no set lunch time. The 2 o'clock drag after lunch was a killer.

So I did it, I think I did a pretty good job based on the fact that after the first day they left me in the office most of the day by myself, but I am glad it is over. I have learned that I will make an excellent temp, but that a desk job is not something I desire for my future.What will I do when I get tired of teaching?