I am not a mechanic.

But when it comes to the machine named WAS 1, I am an expert.

It’s the oldest lift at Mammoth Mountain, running on gasoline and constant maintenance. The bull wheel is exposed and the metal support beams bear the scuffs and dings of three decades of hauling tourists up an easily-walked hill.

And I am a tube park operator.

I stand on my black rubber mat and attach guests seated in tubes to the lift as the orange lift hooks endlessly circle by.

Greet guest and instruct them to sit.

Eye orange hook as it nears closer and closer.

Take a breath, and on the exhale, hook the leash onto the hook at the exact right moment.

Repeat.

For hours and hours on end.

And as the guests come and go, it’s just me and WAS 1 keeping each other company.

I know the sound the machine makes when everything is in working order, a comforting hum and clank as the paddles rotate through the bull wheel.

With a single glance up the line, I can tell if there is too much slack in the system, a warning of tube detachments and trouble to come.

And when the snow changes to ice or the ice melts to slush, I know to move the loading zone up or down the line to adjust to different levels of friction.

Occasionally, WAS 1 and I will have an off day, my hands missing the timing or tubes sliding off the lift halfway up the slope.

And I know that the reason for these failures are my own error or incorrect alignments, but the frustration I feel toward this machine borders on the anthropomorphic.

“The lift is tempermental today,” I tell guests.

“Oh, the lift is acting up again,” I explain.

They smile vacantly and nod, not caring about excuses and only desiring the product they have purchased. Their 75 minutes of sledding.

But it doesn’t matter what they think because when the last guest leaves the park in the evening, I will still be standing next to WAS 1, watching the orange paddles go round and round.

Round and round.