A look at business that goes on while we sleep

We live in a nine-to-five world. For many, the standard work schedule is so customary, we don't often think about the two out of every five Americans who work nonstandard hours. Shift workers, as they're called, may clock in just after dinner and come home in time for an early breakfast, essentially living a life quite the opposite of the workaday world. Whether they work in hospitals, on road crews or in all-night retail stores, these workers carry the same schedule: work all night, sleep during the day and fit errands and other chores into the few daytime hours before or after work.

Some relish the night owl lifestyle, while others bear the scars of a nocturnal schedule. Most make a few extra dollars for the inconvenience. But they all have perspective on what it takes to work the night shift.

Mainebiz recently stayed up with five night shift workers to find out what kind of business goes on while the state sleeps.

Dan Michaud
Second shift supervisor
Kennebec Tool & Die, Augusta
Hometown: Vassalboro
Age: 45

"I will tell you, I don't mind working the shift, but I'm not going to do it forever."

This September, it will be 10 years that I've worked here on the night shift. I'm the night shift supervisor, so I supervise right now 11 machinists. My duties include all technical support, personnel issues. I do evaluations and discuss raises when it's feasible.

We work for several different industries. We manufacture parts for the aerospace industry, semiconductor industry. I really can't talk too much about exactly what we're doing. But it is a lot of defense stuff for major defense contractors, let's put it that way.

Right now, our hours are Monday through Wednesday for 12 hours and Thursday for four. That's if we're going 40 hours. But generally we work four 12-hour shifts. It's Monday through Thursday from 3:30 p.m. to four in the morning.

I've had a night shift job for a couple different places. I had a day shift job before I came here, but the main reason I came was there was a significant pay increase, plus they were offering a big bonus for working second shift. Plus the work hours — the schedule was only a four-day workweek instead of a five. So I have a three-day weekend every weekend.

Back in my younger days it was a problem because you lose a lot of your social life. When I took this job, I had met a new person and I had only been with her for a short amount of time, but she had a couple children and we were looking at money, and this was just such a big jump.

But this place is really flexible, where they understand the balance between work and family life. And so I was able to take time off as needed if I wanted to go to, say, see my stepson's hockey game or my stepdaughter's field hockey game.

Jean and I are pretty comfortable with the fact that we get to see each other on the weekends. She has a full-time job during the day, so I don't see her very much during the week. But I talk to her on the phone a couple times a week to check in make sure everything's going right.

I will tell you, I don't mind working the shift, but I'm not going to do it forever. I'm 45, and I'm thinking [in] another five to 10 years, I'd like to get onto a day shift. And if another opportunity comes up tomorrow in a position that I'd like, I might take it.

With the kids out of the house and Jean home alone, I wouldn't mind being there with her more often. Right now it actually works out kind of good because we have like a 24-hour house. There's always somebody with the pets. Which isn't bad, but sooner or later I'm definitely going to want to get on a day job. I just don't know when.

Like if I was working days I'd be able to watch a Red Sox [game] at night. I watch the games on Friday, Saturday and Sunday and I'll catch a replay every now and then or I'll check scores on the Internet when I'm at work if it's an important game. But that's about it. You just can't watch it like you want to.

When they were in the World Series and they were gonna win it, I'll tell you right now, I left work and went home and watched it. I'm the supervisor so I guess I could do what I wanted. I had been following them since I could play baseball, so that's what I did. I said, "I'm gonna leave for about an hour to go watch the end of this game."

I came back to work after the game was over. I wanted to stay home and celebrate, you know, but I got a responsibility. So I had to do that, which is okay.


Neal Mason
Traffic coordinator
Pike Industries, Belmont, N.H.
Hometown: Winslow
Age: 49

"You can kind of tell when they're tired. Most of my people are upbeat and they're
go-getters, and you can tell when a person's kinda getting sluggish."

This morning we got off at six. Yesterday… what day is today? See, I'm already lost. Tuesday? No, today's Monday. Sunday night, I came down for 6:00 to get things ready for the night shift, for closures on the highway and so forth. I came from Winslow. It's long — it's hard and tiresome. Last week I was working days and I got done Friday and I had a day off there. But I had to come down Sunday night because we had this project to do in Saco. So I came in at six and I'll get out at six in the morning.

We're really on the safety program — everything is safety, safety, safety out there. We're working on the highway, and there's three lanes of traffic we've got to cross to put signs up. We watch each others' backs, and if someone has to cross those three lanes of highway, then the person that's with them has to watch their back and all the time making sure they're safe while they're getting the signs stood up properly and so forth.

It's a long hard night — paying attention to what you're doing and staying awake all the time. You have to constantly communicate with people and talk to them. I check in with them to make sure they're not tired.

You can kind of tell when they're tired. Most of my people are upbeat and they're go-getters, and you can tell when a person's kinda getting sluggish. That's when you tell them, "Take five or 10, whatever you need." The other person will back them up and do rounds or check signs while the other guy's getting coffee or getting a few minutes to themselves. It is a long night, and you still have a lot of traffic out there.

But sometimes it's really peaceful. Around three o'clock in the morning, it's quiet and the traffic's dulled down. We can stand around and chit-chat a little bit. We might talk about our family life. We might be able to take five and talk about my new grandbaby. We do have time to do that. People talk about how they miss their family. I travel with the company, but I also have a family life. [My wife] knows I'm out on that highway and it bothers her.

We do get paid better — the company is really nice. They have a $50 deal as an incentive for working nights; they call it the night shift differential. They take care of my motel room, pay for that, and give me $30 a day to eat on. If I eat three squares, I can get $10 a pop. Then I get time-and-a-half after eight.

I'm kind of more of a person who likes days, but you've got to do what you've got to do to make a living. To me, I'd rather just live the normal life.

Last year, they took me off the road. I had three blockages. I didn't know what it was. Finally, it caught up with me. I was in severe pain, they shipped me by ambulance. I had three blockages — I'm diabetic, and my arteries shrunk right up. They said, "Take it easy so it doesn't get any worse." So far, I've been pretty good. That's one reason the company wants me to watch myself and slow down — they want me there for the long haul. I told them I know when to back out. For the most part, I hang right in there. I do pretty good.


Steve McGrath
Clinical supervisor and respiratory
therapist
Maine Medical Center, Portland
Hometown: Portland
Age: 52

"I liked the pace better. I think you have more autonomy on the night shift — there's less doctors around."

Of the last 17 years, I've worked nights all but four years. It's unusual because most people, once they do their time on the night shift [and] once they get to the day shift they seldom come back to the night shift.

I liked the pace better. I think you have more autonomy on the night shift — there's less doctors around. And we have protocol-driven therapy so we get to make more decisions on the night shift. You can have disasters on the night shift just like on the day shift, but I think overall it's a little bit slower pace; you're trying to get the patients to rest. You get more money, you do get a night-shift differential. And it works for my family life.

I've been married for 30 years and I've got three boys. The youngest is 17 now, but when they were little kids — my wife works like nine to five, well, more like eight to seven, and she works Monday through Friday. And so the kids would have been latchkey kids if I'd have been working 12-hour [day] shifts. This way when they got home from school at least I was there. I would hear them — I'd wake up, I'd be there for them.

I'm in charge of 10 or 11 therapists that work in different areas: the neonatal area where they take care of babies, newborns, the general medical floor; and then there's four special care units — one of them is cardiac arrest, the intensive care unit. And then there's the pediatric intensive care unit. So I kind of am delegating responsibility, directing traffic. Sometimes we have to go out of the hospital in a transport to pick up, usually, a baby in an outlying hospital, a newborn baby that's having respiratory difficulty or a drug-withdrawal baby. Even if they don't need respiratory services, we are part of the team and we go just in case. On occasion, I'll even go myself; I'll go out on a transport and pick up a baby.

It's more laid-back than the day shift generally, but you could have a crisis anytime. During the day shift you have a lot of family members that come and visit and so it's hard to get to your patient. The family needs their time too, but it's hard to get your work done. There's a lot more doctors, more medical students, it's just more hectic.

I cope well. All the years I've worked nights I've seen several people who did not cope well, just could not physically do it. And I think there are two reasons: One, they either can't sleep during the daytime or, two, they refuse to sleep during the daytime. I talked to one woman who was just having a horrible time on nights; she said she couldn't get any sleep. I said, "What are you talking about?" "Well, I had to pick up my kids and drop them off and I had this appointmentÂ…" and I said "If you were working a 12-hour day shift from seven in the morning to 7:30 at night, who would be dropping off the kids and picking the kids up and going to these appointments?" and she said "Well, I'd find somebody else to do it." And I said, "Well, that's what you need to do when you work nights, you need to set that time aside to sleep, it's a priority."

I like to sleep during the day. My wife's at work, my kids are at school — except during the summer. I've got the bed to myself, I've got all the pillows. And I sleep OK at night with my wife. I don't have a problem sleeping, that's key.


Liz McDorr
Customer service representative
L.L.Bean, Freeport
Hometown: Brunswick
Age: 52

"We don't get any dropdown drunks. Most people think we do when the bars let out. But if we do, they are quiet and well-behaved."

I work the day shift [as a librarian] at [Hyde] School in Bath, and [working at L.L.Bean] gave me an opportunity to have a second job. I started part time here, and now I'm full time at both places. I tried to find a part-time job to supplement income because I'm single, I live alone, so having a little extra money was nice. Librarians aren't gazillionaires. When they asked me if I wanted to go full time, I already was doing 24 to 32 hours here anyway, and I said, "why not?" I just kind of fell into it, and it's really been fine, I haven't had many difficulties. I work 80 hours a week.

I work from 11:45 p.m. until 8:15 a.m. There usually is a little burst of people right then at midnight, people just on their way home, coming in from airplanes, flights, things like that. And about maybe 1:30 it slows right down, and we come off the registers and start recovering — folding, making the floor look nice — because the store's pretty well-shopped by the time we come in.

People think that there's a lot of exciting stuff that happens here at night, but it's pretty quiet. We don't get any dropdown drunks. Most people think we do when the bars let out. But if we do, they are quiet and well-behaved. One guy stole a bike once, on the first day of snow in November. He left a trail leading right to his house in the fresh fallen snow. He wasn't the brightest bulb in the box.

There usually are people here — very seldom is no one here, other than maybe way, way off season, February maybe. You get a lot of intense, personalized service when you come into Bean's in the middle of the night. You get good customer service all day long, no matter how busy it is, but at night you're the one — it's all about you, pretty much.

We've got some elderly people who come in specifically because we can help them with their shopping. We have gentlemen who come in with a list at Christmastime, and we walk them right through their list. We have a lot of people coming and going on flights, in and out of Portland. People who've lost their luggage will come try to find a shirt for their business meeting the next day.

We have a lot of families, especially in the summer, that are traveling. Often at two or three o'clock in the morning you'll hear a little kid scream with excitement because they see the fish pond. They're just taking a break from their travels. They know we're open and they stop and walk around a little bit, stretch their legs, and get a free cup of coffee that we have at the information desk. We just try to be really welcoming. A big bonus part of our job is we get to really have one-on-one customer service, and that's really what I like. The best part, absolutely the best part, is getting to know people.

I work at the Hyde School from about 8:45 to a little after five. And then I zoom home and sleep from about 5:30 till 10, 10:15, then I'm off again. [Staying awake], that's a trick. It gets to be habit after a while. It's very disturbing when you can't sleep. It doesn't happen to me very often, but it's pretty desperate when it does, because I need that five hours.

I've had lots of days where I haven't slept at all. I've probably gone as much as 36 hours with not any sleep. Usually I can just fall asleep whenever I lay down, but sometimes it's really hard. Most of the time I don't look really good. But, you do get used to sleeping less. You get two half-hour breaks when you're here for eight hours, and for mine I'm gone — I do power naps. We have a break room, and we just sit in the chairs and nod off, most of us do on the night shift, take a little power nap.

Sometimes in the middle of night you slow down a little bit, but whenever a customer comes in I'm right up again. I'm 100% a people person, and I think that's maybe part of how I keep going. When you see a face, somebody who wants to chat with you, or somebody who needs something, it just completely wakes me up.


Patrick Lally
Sergeant
Westbrook Police Department
Hometown: Portland
Age: 37

"One of the positive things is you get a sense while you are patrolling neigborhoods — especially during that time when everybody is asleep — that you are protecting the community."

On the late shift in a small town like Westbrook it's pretty quiet most of the time after three in the morning. And other times it's exciting because you're busy actually handling hot calls.

I work 10 at night till eight in the morning. Ten to two is my most busy time for running traffic, trying to get drunk drivers off the road, suspended drivers and things like that, because they're more apt to be out during that time frame. And then later when there's not a lot of traffic that's when I might check businesses and neighborhoods.

The problem is that when you're in a car and you're driving around in the middle of the night there's no other cars on the road. If somebody's on foot committing a crime they can hear you coming a mile away, literally. All they have to do is step into a shadow and you never see them. So the chances of getting people is pretty slim, unless you get lucky or they get stupid, I guess.

The hardest part — and if you don't work the shift it's kind of weird — is that when the sun comes up, that's when it's really hard to stay awake. You'd think that would wake you up and you'd feel refreshed, but it doesn't. I find that after a 10-hour shift on the late shift I'm exhausted. But if I work 10 hours during the day I'm fine. You don't leave work at five o'clock and say, "Oh, I really need to go to bed." The late shift, it just drains you.

I just try and stay busy, keep looking for crime and things that are out of place. If I just sit still I'm probably going to fall asleep during some of those nights, depending on how much rest I get the day before. Sometimes if I'm tired I'll get out and walk around different areas, neighborhoods or businesses, just to get out of the car for a while. I try to keep it to one cup [of coffee] a night. I definitely listen to the radio. I listen to CYY, that's what helps keep me up. Sometimes meeting up with the other officers to discuss things that went on in the shift or that we might want to do later. That's another way to pass some time during the slow nights.

[The late shift] is a little tougher on myself and my wife. She's alone at night and I'm sleeping during the day when she has the kids. But as far as the family with the kids, the evening shift [that starts at 3:30 p.m.] would be worse. They'd be going to school while you're at home and then when they get out of school you're going to work. So with the late-hour shift, at least, I see them when they get off the bus in the afternoon, through the evening and I get to put them to bed. Then I'm going to work.

One of the positive things is that you get a sense while you are patrolling neighborhoods — especially during that time when everybody is asleep — that you are protecting the community. Unfortunately, I don't think they think about it. I don't think most people consider the fact that there are police officers out there every night, 365 days of the year, trying to keep the neighborhoods safe and keep criminals off the streets.

Just the other night we had a call that gave me pause. It was a 911 call. There was a guy attacking his girlfriend's father with a knife; that was how the call came in. And then as the officers were responding, it was upgraded to he's wielding an axe and cutting through a door to get at them. And just when I pulled up, seeing the first officer on the scene running into the house and the next officer running into the house, myself running into the house. Afterwards, I thought about it, people don't think about how heroic that is. Most people run away from something like that. Here's a guy wielding an axe and the officers, without a second thought for themselves — it didn't cross my mind — it was just, "There's people in there in trouble and there's a guy with an axe. Let's go get them." You kind of think every once in a while, and say, "Jeez, that's a pretty good group of people I work with."