End of the road after 45 years
From being bitten by a dog with no teeth to being confronted by a naked woman, veteran Timaru postie Brian Senior has seen it all while out on his rounds over the past four decades.
And when he sorts and delivers his last batch of mail today before leaving the job, he says he’ll have many fond memories of a lifetime spent delivering people’s mail.
‘‘It’s the fresh air, you are virtually a professional bike rider, you are your own boss, and if it’s a nice day like today this is ideal getting out there.’’
Senior said that over the course of the 45 years delivering people’s mail, ‘‘90 per cent of Timaru people have been absolutely fantastic to me’’.
‘‘They let me use the phone if I have a puncture, and all the Christmas pressies I get given, they have been bloody marvellous to me ... over the years I have just about needed a trailer to take home the bottles of beer and boxes of chocolates.’’
Senior was delivering people’s post even while he was still at school, starting work as a schoolboy helper doing one mail round a day for two years from 1971.
When he left school he spent six months working for the Post Office as a telegram boy.
‘‘One of the supervisors knew me very well, and he said: ‘Brian Senior, he’s been a postie, he doesn’t need much training’; and I have been working here ever since.’’
Senior chuckled as he told some of the tales he had about his interactions with people on his rounds over the years.
While he was still pretty new in the job he was delivering the mail to his grandmother’s house, when she called him over to help a
"It's the fresh air, you're virtually a professional bike rider ...''
Veteran Timaru postie Brian Senior
neighbour who was locked out.
‘‘Another neighbour came along and held on to my bike, I am climbing up the pedals, up the bike seat trying to climb through this toilet window.
‘‘I felt a hand which was my grandmother’s, and she pushed me through the window ... my whole head ended up in the toilet bowl. I did a 360 turn, they were out at the front door, I turned around wet, and there was another door that was unlocked,’’ he said.
Then there was the dog that kept rushing out to try to bite him.
‘‘I was at the house and I dropped the mail, and I picked it up and I looked down at my leg, and I thought that feels like a hand grab.
‘‘The poor dog had got no teeth, so I went across to the butcher’s shop and bought it a pound of mince.’’
On another occasion Senior went to drop off a package at a house and found a woman standing stark naked by her swimming pool.
He said the woman was now a close friend of the family.
After more than four decades in the job the lack of a driving licence was behind New Zealand Post having to let him go.
However the 63-year-old said that both physically and mentally he was ready to go.
‘‘I have done 451⁄2 years and it’s a long time in one job, and it gets mentally stressful.
‘‘I was saying to my wife the other day, I don’t know what’s worse, a howling norwester ... or a fog over a hoar frost. I don’t think I could carry on another winter.’’
One of Senior’s first acts as a retired man will be visiting his son in Sacramento, in the United States, and visiting his 14-month-old granddaughter.
He is also looking forward to having Saturdays off work and heading out fishing.