I work part time as an Assistant Rural Carrier for the Postal Service; I’m an “A.R.C.”
The position was created when Amazon contracted with USPS for Sunday deliveries.
I'm low on the pecking order; I only carry packages and parcels and never touch the mail.
It’s mostly on Sundays, but when volume is high – as it is this time of yer - I help the other carriers on weekdays.
It's good to be of service to my fellow carriers and of course to our customers.
I feel like the fairy tale hero, Boots, the Seventh Son of the king. His inheritance is hand-me-downs such as the big clumping boots for which he is named. His brothers have gone off to seek their fortunes and, as is common in such fairy tales, they have all gone astray. So Boots goes off too, on his old horse. He goes he knows not where, to seek he knows not what.
I go off too, on all the rural routes; among apartment buildings, to hilltop mansions, through planned suburbs, trailer parks and cabins hidden in the deep woods.
I like bringing people things. I brought a changing table for a newborn to a family in a double-wide. The young man greeted me excitedly – “Just in time! We just came back from the hospital.”
“Congratulations!” I said, “I’m glad I could get it to you in time.”
The warmth of that exchange was with me all day.
Boots goes with kindness: He gives a crust of bread to the ants; helps a fallen nestling back to its nest; slips a silver trout back into the stream, and so on. Small acts of kindness for him but great for the receivers.
In addition to delivering, I sometimes am the receiver. During last December’s arctic blast, while working past dark, I delivered a package across the road. When I returned, the neighbor gave me a package of alpaca wool socks. My feet walk in gratitude.
Boots comes across a starving wolf who begs to eat his horse. Boots dismounts, the wolf eats, then takes the horse’s place. The wolf thereafter carries Boots to his destiny.
I don’t have a magical wolf but I do have an L.L.V. - a Long Life Vehicle - a heavy metal box on wheels. But it is magic. When I drive that truck people wave and smile; they're happy to see the mailman. Drivers even tolerate my slow pace.
Boots' comes to a ruined castle in a land devastated by an invincible ogre. The ogre keeps a princess captive in his castle. Boots and the orincess tease out the secret of the ogre’s strength: His heart is hidden far away where he cannot be hurt.
Driving the area this past year, that fairy tale is all around - the land is devastated as if attacked by a heartless ogre. Fallen trees, tangled wires, piles of debris, smashed cars and broken homes.
With all that trauma came a weariness and a wariness.
Boots jumps on his wolf and heads off for a year and a day to find the ogre’s heart: to the great lake and the island in the lake and the chapel on the island and the well in the chapel and the duck in the well and the egg in the duck and the heart in the egg.
I drive off the highway onto an asphalt road along a gravel way up a ribbed and rutted dirt road for the last delivery of the day – and the signs appear:
“private road”
“no trespassing”
“I can't afford enough ammo for a warning shot”
I come to a cabin, and there is the last sign:
“either you're bulletproof or you're stupid”
I’m not bulletproof but I am stupid. I park near the porch and get their big box, tipping it to get my knees underneath. When I turn around there is a mountain Meema in her house dress, leaning on her walker with a big smile.
“Hello,” I said, “where can I put this?”
“Inside the door would be nice”
I climbed the steps and knelt to set it down. A burly young man grabbed it and took it inside.
“We needed that mini-fridge, thanks for bringing it all this way up here.”
“How are y’all holding up?”
“Lost our shed, but kept the house - got our well and generator. Neighbors helped.”
We chatted awhile, then parted with the mountain ritual
“Be safe now have a good’n”
“Thanks! Have a good’n”
I was still smiling as I drove away. I realized ‘I've just passed a kind of test.’ I braved the gargoyles of the cathedral and stood for a moment in the holy sanctuary of fellowship.
In most versions of the fairy tale, Boots crushes the ogre’s heart and destroys him. But I'm a delivery man and the way I see it, Boots delivers that heart back to the ogre, who then becomes a mere man, full of compassion and bent with remorse.
Whatever problems we have with fairy tales - patriarchy, heteronormativity, or just plain goofiness – they show an important pattern: the hero offers service. Harvest the overladen tree, milk the swollen cow, comb the thorny nettles out – break bread with the stranger.
Boots’ story remind me: the path to the recovery of the hidden heart is paved with acts of kindness.
I have a delivery for you. I hope it gets to you in time. Take care. Have a good one.
