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I like working in the mine very much.  It’s cool and dark and my job isn’t hard at all.  I sit by a door and open and close it when the boys come through pulling wagons of ore.

We’re all friends down here and like each other very much.  We aren’t supposed to talk to each other because that would slow down production.   Our jobs are important  so we can’t stand around gabbing all day.

The surface people need the ore.  I feel it’s very important that they get it.  That’s what I like best about my job.  I like being close to my friends all the time as they go through the door but I like getting the tons out the best.

My best friend is Foreman Pete.  I really like it when he comes through my door.  Sometimes he talks to me.  He told me if I ever heard a cave-in or explosion downshaft, I should step to the upshaft side of my door and lock it.  He said the doors were put in place to keep bad gasses from leaving one section and getting into other parts of  the mine.

I can’t remember very much about it now but I did that not very long ago.  It made me kind of sad to hear miners on the other side of the door begging to get out.

I’m allowed to talk sometimes when it has to do with getting the tons out, so I shouted for help.  Foreman Pete came and opened the door a little so the men and  boys on the other side could come to safety.

Later a rescue crew from the surface came down.  They talked about going into the shaft but then decided that anyone who couldn’t make it to the door on their own were probably dead anyway.

Foreman Pete said I did the right thing.    He said that part of the mine didn’t really get out the tons very well any more so he put me by a new door.

I like this door very much.  Foreman Pete went in and out of the door a lot carrying a light so he could see.  Sometimes he would come back with miners and I got to see their faces.  Most of the time I couldn’t see them because we all work in the dark.

Today, Foreman Pete went hurrying through with a light and then came back with a man who had  lost his hand in an accident.  Two other miners were walking on each side of him.  Nobody looked happy.  In fact, the wounded man was whimpering and holding his arm.

I was glad to get to see my friend’s faces but I was kind of sad too about what happened to the man.  Later, Foreman Pete stopped to ask me how I felt.  “You can go to the surface for a happiness treatment if you need it.” He said.

No, I’m really happy right here by my door helping to get the tons out,” I told him.

I don’t remember any of the happiness treatments I ever got but I do know that I like them very much.  I just didn’t want to leave my work, that was all.

The next day Foreman Pete came through again leading the two uninjured miners by a rope.  They had had a fresh happiness treatment because they were shouting and whooping with joy.

“We’re back in our home shaft, I can just smell it!” One shouted.

“I can’t wait to get a pick back in my hands,” the other one clapped his partner on the back.  “I just hope I can still work as hard as I used to.”

I was shocked to see that their eyes had been removed.  Well I wasn’t really shocked.  I was just glad to see my friends again.  That’s all.

Later I heard Foreman Pete talking to some people in the tunnel that led to the surface.  They were far away but my boss raised his voice once and I heard him shout.  “No more!  You didn’t tell me you were going to do that.  You aren’t going to do that to any more of my people.”
A few moments after that, Foreman Pete stopped to talk to me.  “Do you remember how to get to the old shaft?”  He sounded kind of strange.

Pete is my best friend in the world but I kind of felt like it was best if I didn’t remember too much so I just smiled up at him.

He understood me though and said, “Here, take this light with you. Go there and wait by the door.  I’ll meet you when it’s time for me to go back to the surface.”  I didn’t need a light to go through the mine but I kept it on anyway.   It made me very happy to have it.

I waited by the door playing with the light.  Sometimes I would knock on the door and call to the men sealed on the other side but no one answered.  I suppose they are all dead by now.  I can’t really remember how long ago it was.

After some time Foreman Pete came with an equipment wagon and hid me under a sack in one of the bins.  He told me to stay real quiet until he said I could move.

I laid real still like he said while he pushed the wagon up and up toward the surface.  I had been to the surface for my happiness treatments but since I couldn’t remember them I couldn’t remember being on the surface either.

When we got there I waited silently for a long time.  I could hear Foreman Pete talking to other surface people. They are all very nice, I think.  Foreman Pete is a surface man and is very nice to me.  I like him a lot.

Anyway, I heard one of the surface people say, “It’s been a long day. Let’s knock off and go home.”

Then Foreman Pete said, “l’ve got to take a shower and change, first.”

After a while, things got quiet and then the lid of the bin opened and I saw Pete looking down at me.

“Get out of there, I’m going to turn you into a surface boy,” he said.  I climbed out grabbed my eyes.  “Ow, it’s bright here,” I said.

He said, “Wait ’til you get outside.”

Then he took me into a room where water came out of the ceiling.  It was warm and I liked it very much.

Pete showed me how to soap up and wash off.  We did that several times before Pete said, “This is hopeless.  You’re not going to come clean and even if you did, you just don’t look like a surface boy in the face.”

I was sorry the water stopped but I was glad when Pete handed me clothes.  When I put them on, I felt just like a surface boy even if I didn’t look that way.

Then Pete took me to a door and opened it.  it was a room too brilliant to see. I hid my eyes again from the pain.

“Hide your face in my coat.  I’ll put my arm around you and people will think you are just my son come to walk me home.”

He put his arm around my shoulder and pulled me close to him.  I felt more happiness than any happiness treatment ever gave me.  I liked walking by Pete’s side more than I ever liked getting the tons out.”

The outside was the biggest room I’d ever been in.   We walked a long way before we got to Pete’s house.  When we got there I still had to hide my eyes because it as bright as the outside.

I heard a voice that was higher and lighter than Pete’s.   It was a woman.  I have met women before but I can’t remember anything about it.

This woman talked in the same tone of voice Foreman Pete did  when he shouted at the surface men, only she shouted at Pete.

“You can’t bring a Union boy out of his workplace.  It’s illegal!”

“Amy, I’m sick of it!  I  brought him out to testify about what he has seen down there.  It’s shocking.  His word will have more impact than mine.”

“I’m sorry for him, Pete.  I really am. But you’re asking for big trouble.  I’m not going to harbor that kid and get myself arrested because of it.”

They talked some more then she slammed a door and disappeared.  I was still standing there with my eyes hidden in my hands.

Pete turned off the light and got me this thing that I’m talking into now.  He said he had to leave me for a little while to sleep but he wanted me to tell about everything I could remember.

So that’s all I can remember.

**********************
Pete said I could keep this recorder and talk about things that I remember.  I remember everything that happened today and I liked it all very much.

This morning Pete gave me some dark glasses so I could stand the sunshine which is very bright no matter what you do to keep it out.  He said that surface people say “morning” when the sun comes up.  He gave me a lot of other sun words to use and I remember them all.  I like them very much.

This evening some people came to the house and Pete let me meet them.  They were part of a group called “Friends of the Union Workers” and they had come to hear my story.

When I was finished telling them everything I remembered, one woman asked me if I enjoyed working in the mine.  She had hair like the sunshine and I thought she was very pretty.

“I like it very much.” I answered.

“Good,” She smiled.  “Do you remember me? I give you your happiness treatments.”

I couldn’t remember her but I smiled and said, “I like them very much.”

“Don’t you see though,” Pete said, “that’s all he knows how to say.

“I don’t agree with you at all.”  The sunshine lady answered. “My job is to help people be happy and I think I do a good job of it.”

“You drug them!  Why do you think you have to destroy their memories?  It’s because nothing good ever happens to them and they would go crazy if they could recall half of the tortures they endure.

Your drug that doesn’t allow them to sleep kills them before they’re twenty…”

“Stop it!  If I didn’t care, I wouldn’t be here.  I’m working hard to change that requirement.  I’ve testified in the state house against it.  I’ve come here to find people to help me change things, not accuse me of hurting people I care about.”

I felt kind of sad when the sunshine lady started to cry but I felt very happy to think that she was the one who gave me my treatments.  I thought she was very nice.

“I worry about the drugs too, but now we have a more pressing matter to discuss.” This man was black with long white hair.

“The union’s concession to allow body parts to be removed if they are  impediments to productivity is shameful.  Its going to be passed into law unless we call our congressmen and protest.”

“It’s happening already,” Pete said.  “They altered two of my men yesterday;  ‘Seeing bad things makes them unhappy’, is what they told me.”

The sunshine lady nodded.

I think we should forget protesting the drugs for a while and concentrate on the Surgical Alterations Bill.”  This came from a man with a short beard sitting on the couch beside the sunshine lady.  Older miners wear beards until they go for happiness treatments. Then they come back shaved.

“We need to organize a protest march and lobby day at the capitol,” the bearded man said

I learned so many words today and met so many nice people.  They are all gone now but I like them all very much.
Pete and Amy are asleep and I am going to go sit on the couch.  I don’t remember ever sitting down.  I think I will like it very much.

*************

This morning Amy got a call from Pete.  She said that Pete had been arrested at the mine for taking me to his home.  She was supposed to hide me somewhere but she didn’t know where because everyone knew I was here.  We waited all day but Pete didn’t come home and nobody came to get me.

I like Amy very much and I am sorry I am so much trouble.  It is late and I am going to go lie down on the couch like Amy and Pete lie on the bed.

******************

I told Amy this morning that I didn’t like the mine but I would be happy to go back if that would get Pete out of trouble.  She said, “We’ll see.”

She spent the day on the phone talking with lawyers, talking with Pete, talking with people about the protest at the capitol.  She said I could go to the protest if I wasn’t arrested first.

I don’t know what it is like to be arrested but I am sorry that Pete is arrested.  I don’t want to go back.  This evening Amy gave me some food.  I think I have food when I get my happiness treatments but I don’t remember.  I like this food but Amy said it would make me hungry.

**************
I slept last night and woke up hungry.  Amy made me a breakfast of eggs, bacon and toast.  I liked it very much.

Then Pete called and talked to her for a few minutes.  When she hung up she said that Pete said for us to be strong.  He was being strong in jail even though they were treating him very badly.  This made me sad but I didn’t offer to go back to the mine.

**********

Amy drove me to the protest today.  I can go out now in bright sunshine when I wear my glasses.

She is very nice to me, now.  She says I’m growing more human every day.  I laughed and she said, “see what I mean.  You learned to laugh.”

Once she stopped and got me an ice cream cone.  She said it was kinda food but it was just for fun.  We both laughed when she said that.

It took about an hour to drive to the capitol.  When we got there the protest was already started.  People were carrying signs and chanting, “Free Pete Spooner.”

A man on a platform called for everyone to be quiet.  He said. “I’m from the Mine Workers Union and I urge you all to go home.  I know you are here because you care about miners and their plight but you are just making things worse for them.

“We’ve had to make concessions in these tough economic times.  Some say, we’ve made too many.  But every concession we’ve made has saved someone’s job.  Look at that boy.”  The man pointed directly at me.  “Do you know how easily his job as a door guard could be replaced by automation.  Once automatic detectors monitored for accidents and air quality.  Maybe the union had to give in on one thing to eliminate automatic doors but we created jobs.  Good jobs!  You would be amazed at how many surface people come to me asking for a job in that mine.”

“Yes an amazing number – like zero.”  The sunshine lady had come up behind us.  “He doesn’t realize that we have changed our protest.  The surgical alteration is going up for a vote in just a few minutes and we don’t have enough senators on our side to stop it.  We’re focusing on Pete right now.  He’s basically a political prisoner and we’re going to make a fuss about it.”

Amy smiled and thanked her.  I went back to listening to the union man because he had pointed me out again.  “…and that boy doesn’t look like he’s been abused does he?  No, except for being a little paler, you can’t tell him from any surface child.”

I looked up at Ann.  “Do I have a name?”

Ann frowned,  “I don’t know.  If you were my son. I’d name you Eugene.”

I felt happy when she said that.  Just like the day that Pete walked me home and called me his son.  We started marching then and chanting “Free Pete Spooner – Free Pete Spooner…”

Everytime I said that I thought, I’m his son, Eugene Spooner.

Then we quieted down and the sunshine lady spoke and said lots of nice things about my dad.  The black man spoke and demanded Dad’s freedom and the bearded man spoke about the law and the movement.  I didn’t understand much.

On the way home I told mom about how many new words I had learned and how I was saying them into my recorder every night.  She frowned and told me to be careful and not let anyone know I had it.”

So here I am, back in our home in my bedroom.  I’ll stop recording now and go to bed.

*************

Today a policeman came to the house.
Mom said, “You can’t take my boy.  I have a very good lawyer.”

The man just laughed and asked to come in.  He said he wasn’t coming to take me against her will.

She let him in and he sat on the couch.  “This is funny – your name is Amy Spooner and mine is Henry Forke.”

Mom, crossed her arms and stayed cool.  “I don’t see anything funny about the names Amy and Henry.  What else have you come to tell me?”

He talked to her for a long time about cooperation with the government and patriotism.  When he got up, he said, we won’t take the boy but we do encourage you to send him back to where he belongs.  We’ll take it as a sign that you want to leave this lunatic do-gooder organization and go back to being a good citizen.  Goodbye Mrs. Spooner.”

After he left, Mom put her arm around my shoulder and said to the door, we’re made of tougher stuff than that Mr. Forke

The sunshine lady, who everyone calls Dot and the black man, Devon, called Mom to tell her to be strong and not give in.  They both said they had had similar visits.

We didn’t hear from Dad, today.

***************
Our lights went out this morning because we couldn’t pay the bill.  Dot called but Mom quarreled with her.  I heard Mom call her a traitor to the cause.  Then I heard Dot shout, “What do you think a mine foreman does?”

I think she meant that foremen are more interested in getting the tons out than making life good for their workers, but Dad was never that way.

Afterward Mom said she wished they had shut off the phone instead of the lights.  I do too.  I don’t like the dark.

***************

Today, Devon, and the bearded man, Bill and some other people from the protest had a vigil in front of our house to protest Dad’s being arrested.

Somebody said, “let’s take up a collection for the Spooners.”

But somebody else said, “these are tough times” so they didn’t.

Dot didn’t come to the protest.

***********
Dad called this morning.  I couldn’t understand his words but I could hear he was crying.  Mom was crying with him.  I feel like crying, too.  They wouldn’t have so much trouble if they weren’t protecting me.

**************
I’m hiding in the bathroom at the mine entrance.  I don’t know why I’m recording this.  When they find my device, they’ll take it away from me.

I’ve already been injected with the drugs.  My mom said we were going to visit Dad, she said he had been released and was at the mine.

I was scared to go back to the mine but I didn’t want Mom to think that I didn’t trust her.  When we got here Dad was sitting in the lab where they give happiness treatments.  Dot was there too in a white coat.

I wanted to run because I knew they had turned on me but there was a tiny spark of hope that maybe these people I loved could be trusted.

Mr. Forke and another policeman  held me while Dot injected my arm. Then things seemed to whirl.

Mom said, “I’m sorry I had to do this.”

Dad said, “you won’t remember me but I’ll watch over you and keep you safe.”

Dot said,  “He’ll be happier down where he belongs.”

When they let me go I rushed for the bathroom.  Nobody tried to stop me.

I forgot to ask anyone how old I am but I’m smart, I could have gone to school.

Things are already getting hazy but I feel kind of glad that they are.

My name is Eugene Spooner. I am a person.

But really I’m happy to go back to the mine.

I had a home and a family.  I existed and thought and loved and cried and felt real feelings.

But I think I would like to go back to my old job now.  I like it very much.
–peggynuckles