Thoughtless Theft

For 7 years of my life between 1988 and 1995, I worked as a machine operator for a company that manufactured brushes. The factory where I worked was neither large nor modern, but it did produce an extensive range of brushes. The only brushes we didn't produce were tooth brushes, but in light of how filthy the factory was, it was no major surprise. Theft or attempted theft goes on everywhere, and where I worked was certainly no different. If you liked the new buttermilk or terracotta dustpan set, then in your bag it went. If you required an 18 inch broom for sweeping your garden path, then down your trousers it went, sporting a somewhat unrealistic erection. Handfuls of washing-up brushes were frequently deposited into your bag, to be distributed amongst your many distant or nonexistent relatives. It's fair to say that stock control was an alien concept. One woman took anything and everything, irrespective of whether she had a use for it. It became a source of amusement amongst us whether she'd find a home for the latest colour or latest product the company were manufacturing. As I said before, we produced a variety of brushes, and no one would begrudge her thought process for taking home yard brooms, dustpan sets and dish washing-up brushes. All of which have practical uses. Where her thought processes went awry is when she decided to take home items she had no apparent use for. I lived with her family for nearly two years, so I probably had a better insight into her behaviour than anyone else. From what I observed, she took stuff home that basically gathered dust. It was if in her mind she had a great idea, but once she got home, she either lost interest or realised that her pipe dream was exactly that. She started raising eye brows when car wash or swimming pool brushes 'left' the factory. She neither possessed nor had access to a car or a swimming pool, but both items were collected to go with her many other trophies. Long after I moved out, I recall that an antiquated work bench had been ear marked for the tip. During overtime, her son had been summoned to the factory to drag it home. Sadly, I have no idea what happened to it. It wasn’t suitable to be considered home furniture, so there was much confusion amongst staff as to what she'd do with it. This triggered some to ask the nature of the usage to the items she was taking. The answers were frequently baffling. The plastics department used to mould batons that would be given to another department to turn into toilet brushes. On one occasion she was caught taking a few batons home. When asked what she planned to do with them she responded by saying she would be pushing them into her back garden to scare off the cats and birds. I'm not entirely sure cats and birds natural predator happens to be an army of unfinished bog brushes but what do I know? What I do know is that while she was at work, she would leave her back door open to allow her two dogs to wander out and urinate in the garden, so you would think she'd had the problem covered. Her house was safe from burglars though, unless there was a market for Mills & Boon books and an assortment of Housewares. My favourite story was when she stole a small drum of metal wire, which was used to punch the brush fibre into the plastic or wooden boards. When I asked her what use she had for this wire, she said that it was to repair the bed springs on her bed. I'd have paid good money to have seen that, but it's unlikely anyone witnessed her deluded genius. It is somewhat sad that the company I gave 7 years of my life to no longer exists. A victim of many recessions and wholesale theft. I wonder how my ex-colleague sleeps at night. Probably on a rusty bed, lovingly restored from a drum of stolen metal wire.

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