Posted on 11/10/2019 4:52:02 AM PST by NOBO2012
I get up in Duluth. At 15, until I was 16, I delivered papers on a morning route 7 days a week. Summer, Winter, Spring, and Fall, I would get up at 4:00 am just so I could finish my route in time to get to school.
In the summer I used a wagon to pull my papers, in the winter I use a sled. Some times the weather was well below 40 below with the wind. I remember putting bread bags on my socks and then a couple more pair of socks before I put my older brothers boots on to keep my toes from freezing. I wore long johns and a couple pair of pants. Wrapped up with a scarf and a stocking hat that never seemed to keep my ears warm enough. My fingers freezing, even with the best gloves my Mom could buy. yet I still delivered them day in and day out, sometimes late, but always delivered them.
One day it took me 5 hours to deliver the Sunday paper, because of the news on the front page of two friends I was with the night before who got hit by a drunk driver after I left them to go home. I had to get up early, or I too would be dead.
My dog Prancer would come every day. If I was late, she was already waiting at the corner watching the papers so no one would stole any. In the Winter, little old ladies would let us in to warm up a bit. I got hot cocoa, she got a biscuit or maybe a warm piece of meat.
After I sold the route to another kid, my dog still followed the route for over a year. I came home from the service and my Mom told me the kid who had the route, told her he was shocked that a protective dog came, with the route.
Lake Superior is a wicked monster, awaiting any fool who thinks he is a bad ass. Many a body was found miles up North, if found at all, because the fools dared the lake by climbing over the barriers to go to then end of the pier during to the light house during a November storm.
Haven’t been back there in almost 40 years.
+1. Thanks for taking the time. On a project at work or I’d comment more.
:)
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