My first job was a paperboy for the Marion Daily Republican. My older brother had a paper route and he got my foot in the door. They say it’s who you know. After some constructive words from my brother to the distributor of the daily, the overseer of the operation agreed to let me deliver about 60 papers to four blocks of subscribers. The route was the neighborhood next to mine, so the path to delivery was easy to get to.

The duties were simple and required my attention seven days a week. Monday through Friday, papers were delivered after school, and the weekend editions were early editorials. I set my alarm clock for 5:00am to ensure delivery. Current events were on my back. Movie dates depended on me. When the Christmas season arrived, the Toys R Us Catalog was in my care and each little kid’s list to Santa was composed from the information that was in my paper bag. The job was important and the well being of the denizens of my neighborhood depended upon the tough grind of the delivered daily that I too went through daily.

Rain or shine, I had to make the donuts. The company provided me with plastic bags to swaddle the papers in so they didn’t get wet on my journey. The mayor’s discourse on higher taxes for those in the community needed to be legible. Some may think otherwise, but it was my duty to dispatch the news no matter the message. Honest journalism. All at the age of 11. Not many my age had the capacity to understand the authority in which I worked. I was fully aware. I rode my Murray Flexor as fast as I could and threw the news from the road for a quicker delivery. On occasion, the wind would catch one of the bagged papers during a rain and the rolled up stories would sail onto my client’s roof. The company also gave me about 3 extra papers each day. Perks of office.

My monthly salary was $100. Much more than what my mother paid for dishes. However, in delivering my obligatory two weeks notice that I would no longer be scrubbing skillets, my duties were not relieved. An 11-year-old has no negotiation power. As they say, don’t let your mouth write a check your ass can’t cash. I wrote the check and was now doing dishes for free.

I had no time for such nonsense, I was a company man now. At a rate of $100 monthly plus tips, the rate at which my problems vanished was just as well off. So I did the dishes still, but not with the vigor I once had. I found shortcuts. No need to rinse the things, the towel would eliminate the soap from the plates. And you can forget about shoving my hand inside each cup to wipe the water. I’d just put them upside down in the cabinet. A natural drying process, one that’s better for the environment. A company man with company ideas.

The school bell rang at 2:45 every day, freeing me from the rule of those in charge. I didn’t need regulation and I sure as hell didn’t need to abide by some code of conduct set in place for the juveniles at my school. But I was on a different level now and I couldn’t expect everyone to understand that. I would arrive home by 3:00pm and scoop the stack of papers from the front porch, carry them to the kitchen table, and wrap each one of them with the precision of a doctor with a scalpel performing a brain operation. I wrapped the things tight so I could fit all of them in my bag, and for wind aerodynamics. Hot off the press, as they were, the papers would leave my hands covered in ink and as black as a coal miner’s. I’d leave them that way. The sign of a working man. A man of means, if you will. A point of discord with my mother though, the dirty hands, as they left a trail of where I had been in the house that day. A trail of hard work at the kitchen sink and the table, to the bathroom, on the telephone, and on the walls in the hallway as I cut corners as a busy 11-year-old company man does. Time is money. I couldn’t change. As a man now, my livelihood could not be dictated in such a way as to hold me back from my God-given capitalistic right to work hard and provide for myself. This is what my Scottish ancestors fought for. A set of prints on the toilet stopping me from breaking my back would not stand with them. They would have my mother whipped for her impudence.

After papers were wrapped and placed in my Marion Daily Republican labeled bag, I would sling it over the front handlebars of the Murray and ride fast and loose through the streets with the important information for the day. It was 3:15 by the time I was set for delivery, and everyone was patiently awaiting my arrival, anticipating the daily with gratification as they noticed my hard work. “That Quentin,” they’d say. “There he goes, so fast. He’s gonna get hit by a car.” Little did they know that I was in total control of the world, both in news delivery and the rate at which current affairs arrived. A man’s control of his horse, a hero on a Murray, was of no business to common folk. Admiration and danger are one and the same, and I knew my name would be remembered with the likes of Achilles and Walter Cronkite.

Each month, subscribers were required to pay their monthly dues to the newspaper. Some would pay in office, some by mail, and some I was required to collect the money from. Google Chrome and electronic pay were nonexistent, which was good for me because this is when I received my monetary tips for the month. I had a little blue book and I would knock on the door of those on my list, collect the cash, listen to their extreme praise of my abilities, along with the occasional “please don’t throw the paper so hard at the door next time,” and put the money in an envelope to be counted when I arrived back at my home office. There, I’d shut my door and count the currency. When I collected, the Marion Daily would have a predetermined amount they wanted, and anything over that amount was mine to keep as a thank you for serving my community. Tips were good in those days. Now, machines do the work and 11 year-olds do not have the chance to earn an honest living. Hard work has been replaced by the machine. iPhone applications, auto renew, and people delivering papers out of vans. The paperboy is a dying craft and one that I miss very much.

My first big purchase was a new bike. The Murray Flexor was a damn good bike, but lacked the chrome, front and back pegs, and gyro that a man in my line of worked required. With the money comes a work hard, play hard lifestyle, and the GT Performer would fit my standing in society. The bike ran about $350 and I had that kind of money now. My dad drove me in the ’87 Chevy S-10 to Carbondale, we arranged the bike under his Leer camper shell, and made our way back to Marion. I monitored the fruits of my labor as we drove down the highway, making sure the GT didn’t move. And if it did, I would have my dad pull over for inspection and rearrangement.

The machine had a chrome fork paired with chrome handlebars that provided incomparable control both during my route and during my journeys through the neighborhood with my buddies. Front and back pegs allowed me to pick up my first girlfriend and the gyro let me excite those around me with bar spins and tailwhips.

I bought many things during my time in journalism. Skateboards, a few more bikes, Oakley sunglasses, plenty of CK One, and stylish clothes for going to the skating rink on Friday nights. The place was called Emery Brothers and that’s were I went to show off both my style and my status. I quit the paper route at the beginning of my 9^th grade year. Preparing to take over my dad’s truck, I needed more money so I took a local gig pushing shopping carts. Kept that job until college.

Out of all of my jobs, the paper route was the one that provided the most for me in every way. Financial splendor, social status, and that of an immense journalistic responsibility. I was a true company man, independent and prominent in the community. I was so important that I would get Christmas cards delivered to my home from satisfied members of the area, ones I brought meaning and words to on a daily basis. Since the end of that job, I have yet to receive a Christmas card that meant as much, probably cause the job meant so much and was of the utmost importance to society.