OUR NEIGHBORS: Delivering mail no easy job in Alaska

PALMER — Janet Day is living proof that even in the most extreme examples, neither rain, nor sleet, nor snow can stop the U.S. Postal Service.

In more than 20 years delivering mail in some of the harshest conditions carries encounter anywhere, Day’s route has only been canceled twice.

Day saw the wrath of nature when she first moved to Alaska right after the Good Friday earthquake in 1964. A self-described military brat, the family finally settled in Anchorage where Day’s father became a postal carrier.

“He made it seem like a nice, easy job,” Day said with a smile. “I didn’t realize how hard it would be up here.”

Day started delivering out of the Anchorage carrier annex in 1979. She moved to Texas during the 1980s, then found a part-time job in Palmer filling in for other carriers in 1991.

As the town grew, Day’s job turned full-time. She now covers the area from the Alaska State Fairgrounds in the south, through downtown Palmer and out to the Tsunami Warning center to the west.

The route is equally split between commercial and residential deliveries, she said. Businesses often have heavier packages to deliver, but they offer more interaction than curb-side mailboxes.

“That’s fine with me. … The people in Palmer are so friendly, and I know just about everybody,” Day said.

The business deliveries also offer Day a chance to get out of the elements. Texas had swamps, rain and mosquitos, she said, but that was all pretty mild compared to the Palmer wind.

The wind was what caused her most recent route cancellation. She was on her route a few years ago when the gusts were up to 80 miles an hour. When the Chevron sign was blown onto a fire truck, Day called her dispatch.

“I said, ‘I think it’s too dangerous to go out there when there is a fear the truck is going to be blown over.’”

But windy conditions are not an isolated event. A dropped letter can seem to have a mind of its own when it is blowing in the wind. The wind has kicked up so much dust her supervisors have recommended wearing respiratory masks while delivering mail.

After the wind, the ice is what Alaska postal carriers fear next. Ice caused her only other route cancellation, Day said, and walking up an icy driveway carrying a 70-pound parcel is no easy feat.

“I have never been hurt enough to go to the doctor,” she said. “I have fallen before, but I don’t fall that often considering what I’m walking on.”

Day got a reminder of what she is up against just last week. She was making a certified delivery to a residence when a neighbor ran outside to give Day her mail. The woman slipped and fell into a puddle.

“She said, ‘My mail’s all wet, and I think I broke my arm,’” Day said.

The woman refused an ambulance, and Day said rule No. 1 is no one else is allowed in the mail truck. Day found a nearby worker to drive the woman to the hospital, and the woman referred to Day as her guardian angel as she was leaving.

Day said she had surgery on one wrist that wore out due to the repetitive motion she makes while delivering mail. Thirty years is a long time to do one job, she said, and she hopes to keep going until she turns 60.

She has made a good life delivering mail, Day said, but she admits it’s not as promising as it once was. The volume of mail is way down and there are talks of cutting mail service to five days a week, giving Day two days off in a row for the first time since becoming a full-time carrier.

But, Day said, she still sees a place for the postal service in an electronic world. Businesses like having carriers come on a set schedule, and a letter has more significance than an e-mail.

“Reading something on paper is a lot different than looking at a computer screen,” Day said.

Contact Todd L. Disher at todd.disher@frontiersman.com or 352-2252.