Just returned from walking Norma. It’s 8:42 am, and there’s, oh, eight or nine inches of snow on the ground. It also happens to be f-r-e-e-z-i-n-g, which sucks.
Anyhow, I was in the process of scooping up a warm nugget of love when I looked up and saw the newspaper delivery man. He’s a large guy—bald, African-American, with a deep voice and extremely big hands. He drives a pretty ordinary (as far as handling snow) vehicle—a Chevy something or something. I said, “Man, you’re like the postal service.”
“Better than the postal service!” he said.
I asked him what time he gets up in the morning—1 a.m., to put together the newspapers. Then he drives all around town, flopping one paper out the window after another. For his elderly customers, he literally steps out of his car and walks the newspapers up to the door. He told me he’s been doing this for more than 20 years—”One more son to get through college,” he said. It’s his second job. After finishing here, he works in a hospital.
It’s easy to forget this stuff, when your paper is sitting outside your door, when your mail is waiting in the box, when your streets are paved and your electricity and water works.
But for many, the so-called comforts of life aren’t so comfortable.
They’re work.
