Post Office

Henry (“Hank”) Chinaski gets a temporary job at the post office, delivering mail at Christmastime. The work is easy, so he quickly takes to it. On his second day, a voluptuous woman who lives on his route accompanies him. Her husband is away, so she’s lonely. She gives Hank her address. Hank says he’ll come by and talk that night. He’s lonely, too. Though he lives with a woman, Betty, she’s gone half the time.

Hank takes the exam and physical to become a substitute mail carrier. The job is easy at first, but the brutal schedule quickly takes its toll. Hank and Betty usually stay up past midnight, drinking. He reports to his supervisor, Jonstone, at five o’clock in the morning, and sets out on his route already pressed for time. Worse, Hank and his fellow subs work night routes several times a week, with routes that are exhausting and impossible to complete.

Fed up with Jonstone’s cruelty, Hank files a 30-page complaint, sending one copy to Jonstone and taking another to the Federal Building. He waits an hour and a half, then the clerk takes him to a gray-haired man who berates him for his complaint.