Beware of Cat (7 page)

The Power of the Uniform

Wearing the same outfit to work every day sure makes it easier to get dressed so early in the morning. Even though all letter carriers wear the same uniforms, making us easy to identify on the street, there are subtle differences. For instance, my feet seldom get cold, so all winter I get by with simple rubber galoshes against the snow, while many carriers plod around in heavy felt-lined boots. Because we handle thin pieces of paper all day, mittens are too clumsy, but you’ll find about as many styles of gloves in use as there are carriers. I have a partially amputated finger on my left hand that is impossible to keep warm. To get me through the winter, my ingenious wife slit open the seam between two fingers on my glove, sewed them together, and now my short finger rides along in warmth beside my index finger.

Some letter carriers get by with baseball caps all winter, while others use the
USPS
-issued fake-fur hats with the warm earflaps. We have competitions each spring to see who will be the first to wear shorts out on the route. But all these minor differences aside, the blue letter-carrier uniforms are easily recognized moving through the neighborhood.

ONE AFTERNOON, A DAY-CARE
teacher ran outside, stopped me on the sidewalk, and invited me in to greet her preschool class. Feeling a bit like I had suddenly walked into Mr. Rogers’ neighborhood, I entered to find seven or eight children sitting in a circle on the floor. They had made a post office out of a discarded appliance crate. A slot was cut in one wall to accept letters, and a small American flag topped the roof.

After I showed them my uniform, and the key chain with the strange shaped key for opening collection boxes, one student was selected to show me the old leather purse they used as a mail satchel. The long strap hung low off the little girl’s shoulder as she demonstrated how she delivered handmade letters to the other children. Brightly colored, hand-drawn stamps adorned the envelopes, and it was apparent that a lot of work had gone into the writing of numbers and letters.

“I see you’re learning your numbers and spelling,” I said to the class.

Before I could continue, the little girl with the leather purse piped up, “P is for Penelope!”

Her sudden outburst surprised me, and I smiled down at her. “That’s a beautiful name,” I said.

She wrapped an arm around my leg and asked, “Mr. Mailman, do you deliver to my house?”

Her perky voice and ringlets transformed Mr. Rogers’ neighborhood into a Shirley Temple movie. She looked up at me with big round eyes, determined that I was her carrier.

“Well, that depends on where you live,” I said.

She paused, thinking hard, and said, “I live in Minneapolis.”

I couldn’t bear to disappoint those adoring eyes, so I said, “In that case, I think I
do
deliver to your house!”

She jumped up and down and clapped her hands. Playing my role to the hilt, I returned after work with some
USPS
activity books, as well as an extra letter-carrier cap the children could use while delivering their mail. They didn’t need the whole uniform. With their imaginations, the old leather purse was as real as my mail satchel. But the cap could still somehow make it all official.

JUST AS I’M READILY RECOGNIZED
in my uniform, I know most of the cars that my patrons drive. I’m constantly hailed on the street with honks and waves. Total strangers spot my uniform and stop me to ask for directions. When Lorraine and her pals return from a garage sale expedition, they often pull over to show off the treasures they’ve collected.

I enjoy this familiarity; it’s a small-town friendliness smack in the middle of the big city. On the other hand, it’s interesting to note that when I encounter these same people after hours, without my uniform, they hardly recognize me at all. At the neighborhood coffee shop, or the library, my greetings are often met with blank stares. I even attended a block party one night where everyone in attendance lived on my route. For several minutes I walked around unnoticed before a woman blurted out, “Oh, my God! I know you! You’re the mailman, aren’t you?”

One time in the grocery store, my wife and I ran into Agnes and her husband Ed, a retired couple I had talked to many times while delivering mail. They ignored my greetings and avoided looking at me. The harder I tried, the more obvious it became that they didn’t recognize me. Finally, they hustled their cart down the aisle just to get away. I couldn’t let them run off thinking I was some kind of babbling lunatic, so I chased after them, explaining, “I’m your mailman, remember?”

They stopped, took a closer look, and then nearly fell over themselves apologizing. After I introduced them to my wife, we couldn’t get away for the longest time. Now I usually don’t say anything unless a person recognizes me and says “hello” first. It’s just too awkward and difficult.

SOME PEOPLE EXPECT MORE
out of their letter carrier than the simple delivery of their mail.

“Take this package for me, will you? Here’s five bucks for postage. Just leave the change in the mailbox tomorrow.”

It should be obvious that letter carriers don’t have the time to mail packages for patrons. Besides, we’ve been warned against handling cash for people out on the street. Most of us will occasionally mail items for elderly shut-ins who have no other option, but that’s it.

Another complaint we hear often is, “How come you get here in the afternoon? I want my mail in the morning.”

I try to explain. “The way this route is set up, sir, your delivery is later in the day. There’s nothing I can do about it. Not everyone can get their mail at nine in the morning.”

“Well, I pay taxes. The way I see it, you guys work for me, and I want an earlier delivery.”

Then I have to explain that their taxes have nothing to do with the Postal Service. We’re an independent federal agency. The Postal Service is part of the executive branch of the federal government, but the postmaster general hasn’t been a member of the presidential cabinet since 1970. Through the sale of postage we raise our own operating funds. However, because of this pseudo-government connection, and our daily service to the American public, letter carriers are often asked to perform above and beyond the line of duty.

One of the toughest demands I ever faced occurred when I came upon the scene of an accident. I had heard the squealing tires. Witnesses shouted for help. Several people dialed 911, and dozens of pedestrians and homeowners gathered around. But as I approached the scene, I was the one ushered to the side of the elderly woman who had been struck by a car. The crowd made room for me to pass through, as if my uniform automatically qualified me to lend assistance. Somehow I became the one to sit in the street with her.

I held her cold hands in mine. She wasn’t a resident of my route. I found out later that she lived less than half a mile away. She had been to the bank to buy traveler’s checks for a tour to Norway, the first overseas trip of her life. As she walked home, a car had run a red light and hit her in the crosswalk.

Now it was stopped in the middle of the intersection. The driver stalked around it in a fit of anguish. “I killed her!” he wailed, slapping at his head and grabbing his hair. Punching the trunk of the car, he yelled, “I can’t believe this! I killed her. I just know it. It’s all my fault. I killed her!”

“Will somebody get him out of here?” I called to the crowd. Two men immediately corralled him and led him around to the far side of the car.

“Ambulance is on the way!” someone shouted.

The woman opened her eyes, but they didn’t focus on anything. I leaned closer, offering words of comfort. Seconds later, her eyes rolled back, and I thought this was the end.

“Don’t go away!” I pleaded. “Stay here. Talk to me.”

Time and again we did this. Each time seemed to be the last. I kneaded her cold hands and stroked her bare arms.

“Where’s that damn ambulance?” I yelled. By now the crowd was overflowing the intersection. Traffic was blocked off. Where had all these people come from? And why was I the one sitting in the middle of the street?

“Paramedics are sixty seconds away,” someone called. Now the siren was audible. “I have a patch-through to the ambulance driver,” a man said, stepping up to offer me his cell phone.

For a fleeting moment I wondered how a person should answer a phone with a dispatched ambulance driver on the other end of the line.

“Hello,” I said, much louder than necessary, trying to cover my shaky nerves.

“Is the victim conscious?”

“Not really. She’s sort of in and out of it.”

“Try to keep her awake. Is she bleeding?”

“Not that I can see.”

“Okay. We’re thirty seconds out. Can you cover her? Keep her warm?”

It was at least eighty-five degrees outside. Sweat trickled off my brow into my eyes, but I assumed that shock was the real worry here. The woman’s hands were ice cold. “Anybody got a blanket?” I called to the crowd.

Within seconds we were deluged with blankets, beach towels, and sweaters.

Her eyes opened again as I covered her. A glint of light appeared, and I thought she actually looked at me. “You’re going to be okay,” I lied. “Help is just seconds away.”

Then her eyes rolled back to a ghostly white stare. This time she really seemed gone. Squeezing her hands as hard as I could, I pleaded, “Please, don’t go away! Not after all this. Don’t you dare die on me!”

A paramedic nudged me out of the way. Her lifeless hands flopped to the street as I let them go. I staggered through the crowd. That final vision haunted me for days.

One morning a few days later I overheard a fellow carrier describing how a car had hit a “dear old patron” on his route. I knew it had to be the same woman. Through him, I learned that she survived, although doctors had to put her in a coma for two weeks to protect her brain. Months later she was home, telling her letter carrier all about her injuries—and her revised tour plans. Within a year, the seventy-year-old woman completed her long-delayed journey to Norway. I’ve never seen her again, although I probably wouldn’t recognize her if I did. That first meeting was enough for me.