I want to post something but part of me does not.
This was a hard, hope-dashing week. Today I'll explain the hard part and then maybe in a few days I'll have the peace I need to talk about the hope-dashing part.
I sought this postal job becuase 1.) It was part time and 2.) It paid well, and 3.) It was part time. Did I leave anything out? Oh yeah, 4.) I wouldn't have to work six day weeks, like I did for most of my ministry career and also did for the last two weeks.
Last week I was training on a new route, so four of those days were not full days, 5 to 6 hours instead of 9 or 10. Still I had to be in early in the morning all week, and we've already established how hard this job can be. But that was nothing, nothing, compared to this week.
The regular carrier's car died. We're talking need-to-go-out-and-buy-a-new-one dead. On top of that he got sick this week (or so he says). He wound up calling out four of his five work days. He was in on Tuesday, when I was working one of my other routes. Wednesday I got called in early in the morning after he showed up and decided he was too sick to work. Thursday I had agreed to work for him already so he could look for a new car. Friday I cased mail as training for the new route I was learning (a partial day, yippee!). Yesterday, I was supposed to deliver that new route (RD 3). I spent an hour casing mail and things were going pretty well until another carrier showed up and said "You're supposed to be on R5 today, Jim Regular called out!"
He was right. They had changed the schedule but no one contacted me to tell me about it. As this other carrier pointed out, "They told everybody but the guy who had to carry the route." It is the federal government, after all.
So I wound up working my regular route yesterday. And we got four inches of rain in about an hour. Gosh, it was fun.
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