PAPER ROUND

Fridays were our heaviest, and nicest, mornings. That was when the
Heralds came out. The Herald was our home-town, weekly newspaper and it
doubled our load. We would arrive 15 minutes earlier and sit quietly
round Jimmy's nice, coal fire (he always lit a cheery fire at ~4:45
am), toasting our feet, chatting about football, listening to his
reminiscing about the old town and straining to hear the "thunk!" in
the lobby, which indicated the Heralds were finally arrived.

Late saturday mornings, the one who didn't deliver earlier that
morning, put on his pleasant, humble personality and went to collect
the subscription money (and tips). Sometimes there was the sad pleasure
of getting an enormous, inappropriate tip from an old-age pensioner;
the irritation of fruitlessly ringing the bell of rich people, who were
absent for 8 weeks in a row; or the nerves of ringing a house bell and
hoping that the pretty daughter would beat her mother to the
door.

Sunday lunch time we took the "takings" to old Jimmy who added up the
endless column of figures, disagreed and then always got persuaded of
the veracity of our arithmetic.

Often there were crises (the truck arriving late and frantic cycling
to get to school in time, punctures, oversleeping). Most of these
usually occurred around exam time.

By the time we were about 17 and in our last but one year at high
school, however, it dawned on us that the perpetual lack of sleep,
dozing occasionally in class and erosion of study time might have a
negative effect on the standard of our crucial, examination results.
Accordingly, we earmarked two successors and plucked up courage to
break the news to ol' Jimmy that we were getting out.

To our pride, he was shocked, disappointed and offered to lighten our
workload. But it was too late. And so the great day came when we could
sleep late, like normal--or, rather, like non-working--boys.

We felt slightly guilty for we noticed that our two successors were
showing disturbing, feckless, half-hearted inclinations. It came as no
shock when we received a visit from one of the boys, later: "Jimmy is
agitated and panicky and told me to ask you to come back."

If he (Old Jimmy) had stood in person on the doorstep, we would, I am
sure, have caved in. But his absence gave us strength. "No," we said,
sadly but firmly, as we passed, irreversibly, through that phase in our
life.