Some genius has scrawled “FUCK THIS MAILBOX” real big in marker on a blue box in front of the Northrop Auditorium. Now I guess this is supposed to be funny, but I will admit it angers me. They’ve got electronic eyes all over the place like a science fiction movie, but I can’t imagine … Continue reading Sign of the Times
United States Postal Service
Positively Fourth Street Revisited
Back in 1959 there was this improbable Jewish kid from Hibbing who rolled into town on a Greyhound bus. He flopped for a short while with a cousin at a University Avenue frat house before trading his electric guitar for a double-O Martin and renting a room above Gray’s drugstore. From Chronicles: “Above Gray’s, … Continue reading Positively Fourth Street Revisited
Not Your Father’s Post Office
I had a pleasant conversation with a customer, an English professor, about my work at the post office yesterday. He had been encouraging his son, a bit wayward I imagined, to apply for a job as a mailman or “letter carrier” as they call us even though, truth be told, we don’t actually deliver that … Continue reading Not Your Father’s Post Office
Dog Trouble
If you deliver mail for a living you really get to hate dogs. They bark at you all day. After a while it's like someone is driving a nail into your frontal lobes. Bark, bark, bark! They go crazy. Little ones, big ones, it doesn't matter. Mail slots are the worst. The duct work acts … Continue reading Dog Trouble
Devil Birds
Winter is a grim time for any mailman, but so long as the temperature is above zero and the wind isn't blowing too strong, it isn't that bad. My job was a comfort to me, the dull uniformity of it. At work, at least I knew what to expect. I delighted in hearing coworkers endlessly … Continue reading Devil Birds
Hello, Mailbox
Early on in my postal career I had this little apartment building on my route with mostly Somalis living in it. A little boy with a round mischievous face began coming out to watch me put the letters in the boxes. "Hello, mailbox!" he would say to me. This got to be his little joke. … Continue reading Hello, Mailbox
