FU USPS

FUCK YOU USPS!!

I am admitting a true hatred for the USPS. I spit and sneer and give the USPS trucks the finger every time I see one. Cuss at the local USPS. I have done this since the day Jim passed away. But especially felt it today.

I went to my usual place for lunch and the waitress there that knows me, well, she asked me how my husband was doing and how the job was working out for him.

Oh my. I haven't had to tell someone that Jim had died in awhile. The last time was in September. I think I was also surprised because I eat there all the time. This lady knows what I like to order and always starts me off with my drink of choice (ice tea). She is a very friendly lady and knows her regulars. It was just 'making conversation' question. I thought she knew. I motioned her over and told her. She sat down across from me, took my hand in hers and started to cry. So I started to cry. I told her it was a heart attack.

Her first words to me were "Was it that job? that postal job? I know you said it was stressful." I was crying because she was in pain for me. She had never met Jim, but knew him thru my stories about him. "That's why you have been so quiet this fall".

Was it the job? I am not sure. Was it his lifestyle...the one I couldn't change - like eating habits and such - maybe. I do know the job was both a blessing and a curse for him. A blessing because it was to be a career change and a job with a future and one that would give us a chance to reach a dream. A curse because of the energy it took from him and the long hours. I look back on the christmas photo card we sent out in 2006 and now see how tired he looks. I am mad and sad because I know he was working that job to make things better for us.

I blame the USPS for the long hours and the grueling, energy robbing workplace. I think back and remember the nights when he would be outside inspecting trucks and would call me to talk to him as he did this. He would ask how I was and I would tell him I loved him and some happy funny thing to get him to laugh. He would say thanks, I needed that and I love you too. It was good just to hear his voice change from angry frustrated guy to calmer loving husband. His ranting about work is not an uncommon thing, at any of the jobs he's had. I was his sounding board. Just as he was mine. We were support for each other.

I got him a Sirius radio for the truck so the 45min to 1 1/2 hour drive to work each way would not seem so bad. There was the night last February when it was snowing and he couldn't come home because the last mail carrier was still out in the snow. So at 10pm at night Jim went out to help the guy finish the route. The mail must go thru.

I curse the USPS for no other reason than because Jim would come home to me tired and beaten and worn out and his day should not end that way. The energy was sapped out of him. I curse USPS, mostly just because I want to be mad at someone so I am mad at them. He worked hard to succeed in that job and wanted to have it be the last job he would have. It was.

Telling Charlene about Jim's death was a sad moment today.