Well, almost 10 years. Today was my last day as a paper"boy"!
I started delivering papers just after my oldest son was born so that my wife could become a SAHM. Seven days a week and 365 days a year I was up between 3:30-4:00 am. Rain, sleet, hail, blizzards and snow I was out there. Unlike the postman, we didn't get holidays and Sundays off. Our family "vacations" consisted of day trips because I always had to be back for the next morning. Substitutes were wasted for business travel for my real job.
Nearly 10 years and 4 kids later I finally hung up my bag. There were a lot of changes in the newspaper business over the years. I started out loading my 1 ton pickup full of bundles and leaving them with the paperboys/girls. Then that position was dropped and all the carriers had to pick up their papers at a local shopping center parking lot. And finally, all carriers had to pick their papers up at the central distribution center in a not overly pleasant section of Hartford. That was the death knell for kids delivering papers.
There were times when I felt embarassed to be a paper carrier. But in the end it paid my mortgage and, most importantly, left my wife able to put her teaching career aspirations on hold until all of our kids are in school (only 2 more years, but who's counting?
). It helped bail me out of some pretty massive credit card debt, also. Being a paper carrier and my self-inflicted financial woes (now both former!!!!) aren't things I'm proud of, but doing right for what my family needed and not taking the easy way out when it came to over $40K in revolving debt are.
I slept late this morning, got up at 5:30 and went for a 45 min. walk around the hood. I'm hoping to make this a daily ritual. After my walk, that leaves me with 35-40 min. of free time every morning before everyone wakes up and I have to go into work for 7:00 to tinker with my cars, my boat or weed the flower beds and lawn and other little projects that I've neglected over the years.
I will miss the Christmas tips and a few of my subscribers that were standing there waiting for me no matter the time or the weather for a quick conversation, sometimes a cup of coffee on the fly or some homemade baked goods. Some were actually teary eyed when I saw them after reading the letter I put in last Sunday's papers.
Other than that, I'm looking forward to becoming a more active dad instead of the coffee-chugging crab who often fell asleep on the couch by 8:00. Going away for a long weekend and heading up to Maine for a week or two are finally a real possibility. I'm looking forward to taking the older two out for overnight trips on the boat to give the Mrs. a break. And no more dreading Patriots' night games, getting home at 2:30-3:00, sleeping for an hour and then peddling papers and trudging into work at 7:00 with little to no sympathy from the wife.
What freedom!
