before going into Y.K., I had to pass thru the bunkhouse and of course there was a full - tilt party going on, from one end of those trailers to the other. Talked to the men and ran off a few drinks and was told something of the rut and routine of Giant Y.K. Mine.
Three shifts worked the mine. One was on site. One was at rest. One was into a steely and steady alcoholic psychosis. I was pleased. I had found a safe haven and a fine place to hole up and lay back, where a man of my afflictions could hide and be hidden. I was content.
I paused in the bunkhouse long enough to understand that the camp was into the mystic, a continuous circle of dependencies, going round and round. I agreed with this form of madness in 1976.
An unstable person from the deep east thought me interesting and loaned me 20 dollars. Then I was truly fearless and positively needed a beer.
At the Strange Range Hotel. Where I once again squared off with the same quaint folks who had arranged for me to kip in a grass – patch greenhouse, a week before. When I laid my booty and bounty down, they became a jot excited and ecstatic. It was a rather large sack of groceries, choice delicacies from the 4 corners of the Giant Mine kitchen. It was authentic home – cookin’, the likes of which those O.T. runabouts had never before experienced. Maybe in their dreams…
The friendship I encouraged between those O.T. people and myself was an equitable one, one I had no wish to end, in any big hurry. I had no way of knowing if and when I might need them again and I was ever aware of the long road that waited silently in the shady regions of my mind. Those kindly O.T. residents might not enter into this tale again but we helped each other. What friends are all about.
I slurped back a large flagon of due and deserved beer. Only one and it was remarkable control because I’ve been known to partake heavily and disgracefully on just such disconcerting and downcast occasions. But not then. No. I knew it wouldn’t be smart, to get liquored and lit, not for my scheduled tour with the shift – boss, the coming morning. I could see it… The Strange Range and a rampaging blow – out in camp, culminating in my being a bleeding wreck at 6 A.M. and screaming at the boss – man, thru a 2” rickety and low - grade pine door, to go fuck himself, did not seem like a fitting aftermath to a well laid scheme. I stayed moderately sober.
At sunrise I was a Stein beck man. Hell, I was bright as a new penny. I was clean and dressed, hale and wholesome, fit and fresh, right and ready to work for Giant Y.K. Mine.
First however, it was the excellent camp kitchen and a hearty breakfast and then it was the latrine, for the meanest and most exciting triple – coiler of my interesting and extravagant life. Then I was eager and on the bus and on my way to the mine and now it begins.
Bob, the shift – boss, took me down into the mine, for the walk – about tour. Slickers and rubber boots, splish – splash, up and down ladders, circles and turns, muddling twists, a dim and dismal world where the sun never shined. Total dark, dark, forever dark, penetrated only by our hard – hat beams that stabbed quickly and quietly thru the inky dark. No light. Silence, except for our swoshing and sploshing footsteps and far away, the eerie and constant trilling and prilling sounds of dripping and dribbling water. The chill air wrapped itself around me and touched me thru and thru and was part of me. Gaping caverns, yawning open suddenly, left and right and having to plank over enormous and empty pits, into which a man stumbling could fall and plummet, out of control, to the very center of the earth.
Could I take it? Well, yes, assuredly. Darkness is my friend. I was in my element. All my life I had been seeking such a place, a place to hide, a place where no one could see me. A place where I never had to explain myself.
The solitude and silence of that black pit pleased me greatly. At any moment I expected to meet Gimli and a host of dwarves, creeping stealthily and searching for true silver. Imagination is a powerful gift and anyone can get strange and peculiar in a hard – rock miner’s world.
Other than to consume 10 sandwiches I had built earlier in the mess hall, mainly the morning was easy and uncomplicated.
I do recall one short-lived moment of truth. I remember some kind of asshole standing me in front of a rock the size of a small house and him handing me a sledgehammer and him telling me to make it smaller. I nodded. I took 2 rounding and resounding swings at the bastard and cried out, “No fucking way!” I threw down the hammer, laughed like a lunatic, dropped to the ground and rolled myself a smoke. I wasn’t stupid. Right off, I had recognized that trick for what it was. It was a workingman’s idea of a test or trial. A joke even. Give the new man an impossible task. Let the man know what he was in for. Make him quit or show us he had the right stuff. Was he one of us?
The men were impressed. I’d handled their challenge with grace and grandeur and nothing was ever again mentioned about that horrible fucking boulder.
A fine day’s work. I felt powerful and protected and could only hope that however many days I had left with Giant would be just as rewarding and fulfilling, as gratifying and satisfying. Because, the only question I had, at that specific point in time, was, ‘How long? How long could I hold out before going off the deep end and throwing it all away?’ My attitude was not positive, not a good one. No.
The fever. Yes. I was to learn that hard – rock mining for Giant was not much more than guess work and lights and mirrors. Also, I was disturbed and grieved to be told there was no such thing as visible gold in Giant Y.K. Mine. One third of an ounce per ton was all. High – grading was out of the question. There would be no stuffing my pockets with golden dreams, not in that gloomy world where the sun never walked. No.
Decided to become a muck machine operator. It was a simple job, involving a minimum of risk and responsibility, a job of such nature whereby a lax and lazy person, such as myself, could all but vanish as an unimportant cog within the overall system.
Once or twice each shift, the boss – man would pass by my work area, to see I was producing and generating profit for Giant Mine. Other than a stiff and animated nod and smile at each other, the man left me alone. I could have dressed up a chimpanzee and put him on my machine and the boss would never have noticed and that was how markedly important my job really was.
Every shift, me and my machine, a glorified scoop – shovel on wheels, were expected to fill 30 – 40 grubby and grungy ore – cars, each one of them holding 2 cubic yards of broken rock. Then, some other damn – fool would come along and hook onto the string of cars with an electric engine and roll down the rails, a grotesque shambles of a train, spewing loose in every direction, to an ore – chute, where the cars were tipped sideways and the whole sorry mess went banging and crashing down, down to the lower levels, to the bowels of Giant Mine. From there, the depths, the ore was taken away to the mill for processing. Not my story.
Whenever a drift or a stope or any work area began to taper out, to stop producing 1/3 oz. of fine gold / Ton, the big bosses would put their heads together. Nothing lucrative in handling straight rock. No money in it. Up against a wall. All work on that site would cease and desist.
Enter the evaluation and deception. The diamond drillers. Called upon to poke and prod and drill off in different directions, at any barren turn and depleted region of the mine and any one of those mysterious sub terrestrials could have cried, at any time, “Hey! Our samples indicate that you should go this way!” An erratic method of exploration, I would have to say.
Now, I suppose I’m short on detail and technical expertise concerning diamond – drilling but back in ’76 and working for Giant Mine, I knew then and for certain and occasionally took to wondering on the million riddles that ran thru that rock where no light began. Hell, any one of those bastards could easily have missed a rich deposit; a vein of pure, a mother lode and those hard men never gave a rat’s ass. Those men
