Neither Rain nor Snow nor Heat nor Gloom of Night

Steve Grant lost his job as a marketing consultant at the onset of Covid. He was 50 years old, had a wife, two teenaged daughters, cancer, and a glaring need for health benefits. The good, bad, and ugly of the year that followed is captured magnificently in his memoir Mailman, which is what out of pure desperation he became: a letter carrier in his hometown of Blacksburg, Virginia. How hard could it be managing a rural route where this Eagle Scout spent his formative years, where his parents still lived, in well-traversed Appalachia? Really, really hard, we learn. Among the many worthwhile lessons contained herein – the founding principles of the USPS, the oath one takes to deliver mail, the law regarding its operation, starting with its independence from even a single red cent of taxpayer money – the stickiest one is the guts it took for him to learn the trade. Grant suffered multiple near-total breakdowns, one on a customer’s front lawn, impelling the reader to realize how little we know about the stressful logistics of being a part of the postal service and whether we’d have what it takes. (I’ll go first: nope, couldn’t do it.)

Grant is clearly bright and talented; we recognize that from the opening chapter. A-student that he is, training and orientation prove to be a breeze. The trouble starts on Day 1. “The reality of just how slow and inaccurate I was dominated my waking thoughts,” he writes. “At night I dreamed about losing the mail, of being behind.” Just as we see today with delivery drivers sprinting across properties, dashing back to their truck as if it’s about to be stolen, the author is constantly under the gun, taking twice as long as any teammate to “case” (think slot) the day’s mail, his supervisor’s glare bearing down as he’s challenged to even start his route, never mind finish within tight timeframes. Grant’s saving grace is his likability, with his colleagues – a band of workers that includes the cool, the kind, the kooky, and the conspiracy theorists so vocal during Covid – who seem so willing to advise this rookie. Inspiring is his willingness to learn, to tough it out, and overcome “profoundly painful feelings of embarrassment and inadequacy.” As if in a twelve-step program, he just has to take it one day at a time and mimic the humble grittiness of his teammates.

Even so, we’re provided myriad reasons to quit. Take the injury rate. For Postal Service employees, it’s higher than in coal mining and construction. Rural carriers blow out their lower backs, tear rotator cuffs, and sustain neck injuries from the basic required motions. Then there are the elements. Grant makes us feel oven hot and bone cold as we accompany him on his route (as his daughters did occasionally, which is both illegal and sweet as pie). And the solitude. “If you want to get down to the bare metal of who you are, of your soul, then what is required is solitude,” what he terms “the high lonesome.” It helps that his wife coaches him to simply survive and advance, as her hero Jim Valvano would have advised. No spoilers here. Read the book to learn Grant’s fate including the half-hilarious/half-gut punch lesson he learned about qualifying for Medicaid. One imagines he has no regrets. Shit happens, and for a reason, and if nothing else the result is a gripping, white knuckle tale.

If you have anything to say about this – or book recommendations – kindly post below (rather than emailing me) to spark conversation. Thank you!