Dave held the pink highlighter a quarter of an inch above Roberts name on the employee list sheet. If your named got the pink highlighter on this sheet, it’s meant your job. Massive layoffs had been coming down the pipe and now Robert sat across from the small pressboard office desk awaiting his sentence.


“So,” Dave hissed “are you going to go to Trash?”


The phrase “going to Trash” had become one of the worst phrases you could hear. Every person who heard it cringed, and ran for the hills. It simply meant instead of working on a proper construction site working the heavy machinery, that you’d be running a ‘masher’ over at the city dump. Up until now Roberts job had been running a front loader moving dirt, concrete or just about anything else you’d find laying around a construction site. He’d been happy with that. He’d mount his loader early in the morning with his little lunch pail, little headset and pack of Camel non-filters. He guessed he could do the same thing at the dump.



“Well, “Robert said after a deep inhale. “I do like working, so I guess I’ll do just about anything you need me to do.”


And just as quickly as that, Robert was thrown to the wastelands. Literally.



A ‘masher’ is a large piece of ridiculousness. It’s very similar to a bulldozer, but on Barry Bonds-esque steroids. Instead of tread the masher has four giant rollers for wheels covered in large metal studs about 9 inches long and the width of a grapefruit. A big juicy west coast grapefruit. The wheels themselves are probably about 9 feet tall and look about as menacing as anything can look on this Earth. Attached to the front is a very sadistic looking plow with nasty big ripping teeth. The job (and loader) exists for one reason only, to compact the trash into the dump. What better way than to run a bazillion ton tenderizer back and forth over it? The minute Robert saw it he knew his job had merely been moved, albeit to a far stinkier locale, but this was essentially the same machine as his front loader.


He quickly realized how tedious this job was going to be, he had two basic chores to accomplish over an 8 hour shift in the dump. First he had to put the loader in drive and roll over the vast wasteland of refuse. Second, he had to either put the machine in reverse or turn it around, then drive it back across. Once he’d finished the routine of making one good pass, he’d repeat ad infinitum. Back and forth, back and forth. Up and down. To change things up a bit he’d make a circle pattern for two hours. Sometimes he’d compact in a criss-crossing diagonal route, imagining himself mowing the lawn in Tiger Stadium. If he was really lucky he’d find an old water cooler or hot water heater that he could push around with the plow in the front. Then one warm august night, the monotony was broken.


“Tonight,” Dave said as he clapped Robert on the shoulder “you’re going to taste a whole new world of life in the dump. You’re going on animal patrol.”


“Animals?” Robert asked. “You mean like keeping them out of the trash or something?”


“Not exactly, you ever have a dog Robert?”


“Growing up I had a Shepherd/Border Collie mix named Max.”


“And, if I may ask how did Max die?”


“Ah hell, he was about 16 years old. He just became a broke dick old dog so we had to put him down.”


Dave let a moment of silence fill the evening air between him and Robert.


“And where do you think the vet put little Max after he shuffled off this mortal coil?”


Another long moment of silence passed between them and then the horrible truth hit Robert like a wrecking ball.



“Ahhcck, no! No way!” Robert spit out while desperately trying to hold back a sudden bout of nausea. Though he’d soon look back on this bout of nausea and soon remember how mild it was.


“You see Robert, when the vets around town put down the animals that are too old, sick or just plain mean, they bring them here to be put into a ‘mass grave.’ So we need a guy who can dig out a giant trench with a front loader and the give all the little doggies and kitties a proper burial.”


“You think a mass grave via bulldozer is a proper burial?”


“Let’s not argue semantics Robert. Bottom line is usually we have Jimmy for this work, but tonight he’s not here. So it falls to the new guy, and that my good man, would be you.”


Robert remembered seeing Jimmy working on the late shift. After this discussion a few of Robert’s questions about him were answered pretty quickly. Originally he though the dim witted Jimmy was just quite and pretty weak stomached. He always saw Jimmy in his dingy yellow hardhat caked with dirt and God knows what else, and noticed he not only had big blue earplugs jammed in his ears with a thin red vinyl cord connecting them. He also had one stuffed up each nostril. Jimmy’s name was never spoken in the same sentence with terms such as “hard worker” or “good work ethic.” Robert gradually became aware Dave had put him on animals and outhouses exclusively in an effort to assuage him to quit outright. In Roberts mind if the stench of rotting animal carcasses didn’t make him quit, weeks of cleaning out shitters in a dump on top of it would.


“The carcasses get delivered after sundown so no body outside of us has to look at them, and we wait until about 2 or 3am to bury them. Just to make sure no looky loo’s are about. You just head up over the north brim, plow a good trench in the trash, and nudge the poor dead buggers in. It’s nothing too taxing, but mind the smell.”


“Well no shit mind the smell. Jesus.” Robert looked over toward the northern most brim, seeing only a light pole and the mound that signified the beginning of the land fill. “Jimmy does this every night?”


“Not quite. Sometimes, there just aren’t enough corpses to warrant doing it. Like the last few days. We just keep em covered up there, and then bury em all in one fell swoop.


“Wait! So you’re saying there are several DAYS worth of dead dogs and cats up there? That have just been sitting up there with a black tarp covering them?”


“Pretty much, except I’m pretty sure there is at least one horse in the mix too.”


“Horse!?” Robert nearly screamed, “Jesus Humphrey Christ. I mean…Christ.”


“If I were you, I’d be careful of the horse. The dogs and cats can just get scooped up and dumped into the pit, but the bigger animals…” Dave finished that statement leaving an almost questioning tone lingering in the air, paused and continued. “The bigger animals, well they bloat up good and you just can’t pick em up in the scoop. You gotta nudge them along, just push em in. If you’re not careful though, they’ll pop!” He emphasized this last statement with a slap to Roberts back. “Just like a puss filled balloon.”



After that evening Robert did his best to never have to do that most foul of jobs. He also now knew full well that Dave did no I the least exaggerate about the explosiveness of a dead horse. One Saturday evening, however, a very large truck with covered sides began it’s slow creep through the gravel trails that served as roads through the dump. From a slight height advantage Robert could just barely see over the covered walls of this truck. He leaned over the cab of the loader to get a little bit of a glimpse of the cargo. He wasn’t quite sure, but he saw a large grey mass gently swishing back and forth with the rocking of the flatbed. He could not see the whole load, but he did notice it heading towards the animals section of the dump. He saw the driver talking to one of the foremen, and when he opened the back gate the floor let out a cry that was best described as half scream and half uproarious laughter. He pushed the image from his mind and started his long night of compacting.


That night around 2am Robert had the feeling that he needed to be as close to the North Brim as possible to hear Jimmy’s reaction to the surprise load of the day. Mainly he wanted to know what the cargo was. At that he began to hear the rumble of the dozer coming up to the Brim, and he saw the lights peak over the mounds of trash. He heard the dozer switch into neutral and watched Jimmy climb out of the cab. Jimmy wandered around in a circle close to the base of the rig and swung his arms back and forth a few times, obviously distraught and maybe…just maybe slightly amazed. Over the next several minutes Robert watched the dozers light moved back and forth, it should be noted they were moving VERY slowly, and he saw Jimmy attach a chain to the shapeless mound. Jimmy tried to do just about everything to move this mass of bloated animal corpse. Finally about 15 minutes later the dozer left the brim and the mound of necrotic fauna in total darkness.


About 5 minutes after Jimmy left the “mass grave”, Robert’s two-way radio went off.


“Robert, we need you to head on up to the office.”


Robert stared at his radio, knowing full well there was only one thing they could want him for. They needed him to help with this massive internment.


“Um…no. Sorry but I’m terribly busy.”


“Just get up here.”


Robert took the long way around to the office, thinking of illnesses that could’ve afflicted him. Trying to come up with something, anything, that could get him out of this horrible impending duty. He looked around and didn’t see Jimmy but the loader was waiting there. The plow looked as though it were melting in the scattered shadows tossed by the light towers. As he got closer he realized it wasn’t melting, it had great gobs of “stuff” hanging off it. What was the stuff dangling from it like Spanish moss in a weeping willow at the beginning of Summer? It was more viscous though, like slime that you could get in a plastic bulb from the quarter machines in the front of K-Mart. It looked a lot like that slime. The stench far outweighed the grotesque appearance of the dozers plow.


Robert had worked in a Seafood restaurant before. It was a nice little diner, where he bussed tables and did dishes. One morning when he showed up for work, he saw the kitchen staff all standing in the parking lot. He thought there must have been a fire or a burglary or something. Once he got within 20 feet of the back door a repugnant odor hit him like a linebacker. The walk in freezer had gone out and about 200lbs of beef and seafood had gone bad. The smell had caused them to close for the day; they couldn’t get rid of it and definitely couldn’t expect customers to come in. Well the smell of bad fish and steak was nothing compared to this. It smelled similar, but as if the meat had been left alone in a heated room for about 2 weeks. Not to mention the fact he was still in a city dump.


“What the hell is that?” Robert choked the words while smiling broadly. He saw on some TV show that smiling retards the gag reflex; making is easier to not vomit.


“That was Jimmy’s assignment tonight, or what’s left of it.” Dave said while tucking his thumbs into his belt. “But that would be your project now; Jimmy finally decided he’d had enough of the recycling game. He quit about 5 minutes ago.”


“Jimmy quit? The guy cleaned shitters for two months! What in the hell is up there waiting for me?”


“Well there is no good way to break it to you. Robert, there’s a pachyderm up there. An elephant passed away the other day at the circus, and they kindly asked us to ‘take care of it.’ So we graciously took it. I’ll tell you man, when I saw that thing earlier today…You know how elephants have wrinkles and fold of skin? Well this one didn’t”


“Aww, come on man. This is off the scale. Jesus!” Robert yelled, all the while wearing this giant grin from ear to ear. He was still trying not to toss his lunch up.


“Well I’m guessing the behemoth up and popped on ole Jimmy. Tried to push it a little too hard would be my guess. So the good news it most of what left is pretty mushy, maybe you can just scoop earth around it and dump it that way.”


“Aye, aye captain. This will be remembered right? I mean I get serious bonus points for this one, correct?”


He walked towards the dozer, with its grizzly trimmings and mounted up. The smell, though it was impossible to get used to, was getting less atrocious. It was in fact getting almost tolerable due to a steady breeze.



Two hours later Robert had just about finished moving large chunks of Pachyderm in its own special hole. The ribs, very similar to the opening credits of the Flintstones, were fairly tough to move. When the final pieces were interred and the place had been covered, Robert found the longest wooden beam he could find and wrapped a large swath of neon orange material around it. He fashioned it to resemble a large flag and staked into the earth. I t would become the national flag of Pachydermia. No one from that day forward disturbed the earth around “Pachydermia” under fear of releasing a stench fearsome enough to evacuate half the city. Robert thought about that pink highlighter and where exactly that single tiny writing instrument lead him. If the time came again, he wasn’t so sure if he’d just take any job coming along. The next night, however, he was back to normal driving his routes across the expanse of refuse. Tonight, he was making circular impressions one on one side of the dump, and one on the other. He was driving the zamboni in game 7 of the Stanley Cup Playoffs, clearing the way for another Red Wings Stanley Cup.