Denver 2017 - Cityscapes and Architecture, Reflection from the Capitol Grounds / Slaughterhouse Shroud Diapers

This one should have been published earlier in the reflections series, but here it is nonetheless, captured from the grounds of the capitol.  Zoomed out from the same spot is the picture below.
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(continued from post of 09/10)
So they moved me on the shroud line to the floor position, where it was our job to pin the bottom flaps of the shrouds up like diapers on both sides of the carcass.  This pouched the loose ends of the meat and fat into a nice tidy bundle.  Had to hurry, though...within about 15 seconds the sides disappeared through some doors into cold storage.  Another part of the job was to sterilize the shroud pins, brought to us from the other side of the plant in a stainless steel cart, with a big yellow hose that gushed extremely hot water.  After sterilizing we would use those pins while every so often handing some up to the girls when they ran out.

I thought, OK, didn't do so well up high... maybe here it will go better.  Well, the dance routine continued with the sides of beef, and after a couple of days my steps were not getting any smoother.  The guys kept telling me to relax, but after the failure up top I was tense and would often send the beef swinging and spinning, sometimes following it around in a complete circle.  The dancing continued, sometimes ending with a view of my partner entering the cold-storage doors, half-dressed with pins uselessly dangling from the shrouds.  It wasn't getting any better.  But, to my credit, it was not for lack of trying.

My wife has always said that I have tofu skin, and that fact became apparent after a few days on the bottom of the shroud line.  My desperate efforts to drill the pins through the cloth and into the beef caused holes to develop in the skin of my right hand, clear through the epidermis, in spite of the fact that I had on two pairs of gloves.  At first I kept it to myself and refused to quit.  But after two more days it got so bad I couldn't ignore the injuries and reported to the nurses station.  They took one glance at my hands and called in the head foreman, whose name was Glenn.  When Glenn saw the number and size of holes in my skin I was immediately reassigned to another station, which at level one was known to be one of the easiest jobs on the floor, where injured workers could convalesce until they were able to go back up the line.  Very fortunately, this was where I stayed for the remainder of the summer.  From that point forward, for the duration of the summer of 1978, I was to be a fat washer.