So it's come to this.
Employing an exhaustive workaround of intersecting lines and buckets so we might safely pour our precious material down the drain, I never asked why we didn't just rig the overhead vats to rotate. I knew every hair was numbered, and was happy to pass a hat.
It didn't matter that success only spread me thin until it slipped through my hands- I had potential once. I was ranked the 2,548th best employee in the button factory, and reached new heights of homogeneity every night shift.
And then one day it wasn't fun anymore. I still went through the motions, sorting cyan from cerulean, green from gold, saving what I could and letting the rest slip away. I kept my weary fingers in the dike, but knew eventually everything reached the sea, and Monday always came. My scores began to drop like rain.
Eventually I could no longer resist the urge to turn this bubble gum and twine assembly line into an arts and crafts project. My contribution was less than appreciated, but what it lacked in score it made up for in satisfaction.
