Stocker Hands

 This is a repost from my old blog that is no more.  I wanted to get it back up here.

First posted May 24, 2009.

Yesterday I dropped our baby.  On my part, it was a stupid overestimation of his ability, combined with my lack of attention for what is most important. 

Like he’s done a thousand times before, he was sitting on my left arm.  We were in the yard and I was trying to set up his playpen.  He doesn’t love the grass yet so I didn’t want to set him down.  He’s always pretty good about staying up there.  But, he’s also still a little young, so I normally hold onto his leg with my left hand to help him with balance.  For some reason I wasn’t doing this.  I’m not sure why.  Maybe I was using both hands on the playpen.  It wasn’t opening up correctly and I was getting frustrated.  I admit it held more of my attention than it should have.  The reason I know this, is I have no idea exactly how he fell.  I assume he moved one way at the very same moment I moved the other.

In a split second he was completely airborne, his stretched out body falling toward the ground.  His eyes opened wide with surprise.  Instantly my attention shifted from the playpen to the baby.  I needed to act fast. 

After high school I worked in a grocery store as a stock clerk, or stocker as we were called.  There I would drop things all the time: cans, boxes, jars, etc.  Over time, I learned a few things about falling objects: one, catch it if you can, two, if you can’t catch it, get your foot under it, and three, if you can’t get under it, kick it before it hits the ground. 

Obviously catching is ideal.  But, because everything happens so fast, catching it is also the hardest of the three options.  In the 18 months I stocked groceries, I worked hard to develop what I’ve always referred to as, “stocker hands.”  Stocker Hands need to be quick and accurate or product will be wasted. 

An object pulled by gravity falls the first 32 feet in one second.  In a fall of three feet, you have just over 2/5 of a second before it hits the ground.  At four feet, an object will strike the ground in just over ½ a second.  Adding to the complexity of catching, normally your hand is above the thing when it falls.  You have to get under it quickly, or you have to grab it from above.  To catch from below, you need to be faster than from above.  But catching from above is preferred because it is safer and more accurate than grabbing.  Decisions, decisions.   

If you can’t catch it, stop with your foot.  One thing to keep in mind, especially with hard or heavy objects, is that your foot may get smashed in the process.  But if you lift your toes, it keeps them from being compressed between the object and the ground.  This takes some of the sting out of the impact. 

And if all else fails, kick the falling object just as it hits the ground.  This absorbs and transfers the downward motion laterally, usually saving the item from being dented or breaking.  One word of caution here is to be careful to not kick the object too hard, as this can do more damage than good.

So my son - my baby, who trusts his dad completely and, through no fault of his own - is falling.  He’s about 3 ½ feet from the ground and will land squarely on his back. 

Time slowed down as I recognized he was gone.  I dropped the playpen, turned my attention and my body to face him, assessed the situation, bent down and reached toward him.  I extended both hands under his little falling body, and caught him about 18 inches off the ground.  A little help from the calculator tells me all this happened in about 1/3 of a second. 

Over the years, for one reason or another, I have appreciated stocker hands on numerous occasions.  I’ve dropped tools, jars, chainsaws, whatever.  But, if I only caught one thing in my life, and let fall everything else I ever dropped, this was the one catch I am so, so thankful I made.

Clark