September 14, 2015 | Occasus | Issue 5 | Fiction

A Day in the Life of a Corn Research Assistant

   
If saying that all you have to do is drive to a corn field, walk around in that field, and write the date when certain plants have reached maturity makes the job sound terribly uninteresting, I’ve made it sound much better than it really is. The scorching summer heat turns boredom into a torturous exercise of endurance. The field’s dense rows of corn block the cool breeze from soothing your exposed flesh. A stinking mixture of sweat and oily sunscreen coats your skin, acting as an adhesive that traps the golden corn pollen against you and permanently stains your collar and sleeves. The yellow gunk irritates your skin, causing an itch that further aggravates the papercut-like scratches you receive from the corn’s leaves.

 Think that sounds bad? How about the insects that fall from the plants, clinging to your hot, irritated, shredded skin, biting and pinching? Then there is the black and yellow menace. The tyrant of fear we refer to as the zipper spider. No one has been bitten by one yet, but they have sent their share of people running out of the field. The worst part about this spider is walking through its web, stretched between the corn stalks, knowing full well the little bugger is attached to you - this thought never fails to make your skin crawl. Maybe it’s on your hat, maybe on your shirt, maybe inside your shirt! You never know, but you will spend the next five minutes swatting at every little poke you feel from head to toe.

You breathe a sigh of relief as you realize you have finished this section of the field. This small victory means it’s time for a drink. You pull the water bottle out of your apron and raise it to your lips, anticipating the refreshing coolness of water splashing against your parched tongue. Refreshing? Not so much. The water has become tepid and about as satisfying as a drink of bath water. You now notice the water’s dreadful taste: the pollen has coated and somehow penetrated the mouthpiece of your bottle.

You finish the next section and get out the map. Shit! You realize you’ve forgotten to count the filler rows for that one, so the dates don’t line up with the proper rows. You redo the section; luckily it was small. Finally finished with this field, you start heading out to the road, hoping your field partner is done his/her section so you can head back to the station and then home. Turns out your field partner has been done for over an hour, waiting for you to finish—company policy says they can’t help you because it affects dating consistency.

You finally get back to the station only to find out every other crew went home early because it rained basically everywhere except where you were. Exhausted and in need of a cool rinse, you drive home, shower, and rest, knowing tomorrow will be just the same.

GARY JACKSON is studying music at Western as a double bass performance major. He composes music, plays in several bands, and has recently rediscovered his childhood interest in creative writing.