The Final Night

Two weeks go by in an instant. At least that's how the last two have gone for me. It's the day we didn't want to arrive, but a day that had to come sooner or later. It signifies the end of an era, an era that may never be the same. Tonight is the final night that my crew at work is all together before everyone goes their separate ways. Yes, we will all still see each other. But never again will we all be assembled as a group. The company giveth but taketh away. One of the hardest working group of people will be separated after tonight.

I am not as upset as I was compared to my previous blog. I have accepted what has happened and am looking towards the future. I don't forsee it as being very awkward at all because many of the people that will comprise the "new" crew are folks I have worked with before or talked to. I think it's going to be a smooth transition for me. The last time I wrote in my blog, a "proposed" listing of workers was put out and it comprised of people I didn't really care to work with. Not only that, but we would've been the most inexperienced crew on the floor. Thankfully a new list came out and I'd consider my new crew to be one of the most experienced crews. All in all, I didn't make out too bad after all. But, it's still no consolation to what we have now. It won't be the same and I'm sure there will be an adjustment period for a bit. But all in all, I don't think it's going to be as bad as it looked before.

This blog will be a tribute to concentrator operating crew 4 where I work (my crew). Yes, we didn't always do everything right but we sure tried our darnest to do what was best. We always stayed busy and kept on top of housekeeping. We did our best at keeping the place running, even when things were at their worst. As one of my co-workers said last night, we may be split up and placed on different crews, but we will always be the original crew 4 - that will always remain the same. We've certainly had our good days and bad, and there were times when I felt frustrated or stressed out because of the events of a certain day. But I usually got over it and it was always a pleasure to come to work knowing that I was going to be with the people that comprised of crew 4. I believe our bad days were rare compared to the good. We always did everything the best to our abilities and that is one thing we can all be proud about after our shift is through tonight. We had our laughs, we had our doubts, we had our fears, and we had moments that upset us. But we always persevered together, just as we'll persevere tonight once the shift ends and we leave the mine one last time as crew 4.

It's nothing to be sad about as we will still see each other during shift change. But there are definitely things I will miss about as we split up. We'd always have wonderful parties during certain occasions - such as holidays, where people would bring in food and we'd have meals that would blow away what we'd usually have during break. Each member of the crew would get a birthday cake celebrating their birthday, paid for by the crew. We just had a tremendous comradery that's irreplaceable. At least I'll have a ton of memories to carry on as the new crew unites tomorrow.

So, to Brad, Kris, Carla, Mike, Paul, Alrick, and Adion - it's been a pleasure working with you. Always and forever, crew 4.