I have to admit that I’ve been enjoying the dickens out of my retirement. I’ve been retired long enough now (18 months) to get real accustomed to not having to go to work and just waiting for the check to come at the end of the month. I’ve gotten so out of the habit of having any sort of time structure in my life that I decided to get a part time job. 
     Although I drove for UPS for 30 years, I always looked back fondly on the job I had before I put on my first pair of browns. I was florist. Now a florist isn’t the greatest job, it has 5 peak seasons. Valentines Day and Mothers Day being the worst. But I loved my job there, I started out as a driver and worked my way up to designer and even shop manager. But the pay was not the best and I was starting a family, so I took a look at Big Brown and decided to make a career there.
     But now that my career is over at UPS, I’ve gone back to the flower shop as my first post retirement employment. And it’s as much fun today as it was 30 years ago. I’m back where I started, delivering bokays. I work maybe 10 hours a week, usually three 3 hour+ days. It’s a rough schedule. And I crank out maybe 4 stops an hour. I’m not hustling. I stop to smell the roses.
     One of the aspects about floral delivery that most folks don’t think about is that we do a lot of funeral work. I’ve got 6 or 8 mortuaries that I go to. There is always a flower door just for people like me. Most times I just drop off the arrangements in the flower room and sign the log  and I’m on my way. But once in a great while, I’ll be asked to place the flowers in the viewing room.
     Well, last week the inevitable happened. I was asked if I could put the casket spray on the casket. An open casket. Well, I mustered up my best delivery man face and I walked right in there and I did it. It was just me and the mortician and the other guy. When I looked down at the other guy, lo and behold, he was wearing a Teamster jacket. My Local. I had to stare for a second. I couldn’t look away. 
     The mortician finally said something, like can you move it a little closer to the body, and it snapped me out of my trance. I hurried on out of there, but it got me thinking. I wonder if I could be buried in my UPS uniform if I wanted to? I mean after all, I spent 30 years in browns. That’s how most people know me. Strangers could walk into my funeral and say, “Oh yeah, I know that guy!”
     But one thing that came to mind is that that other guy owned his Teamster jacket.  We don’t own tour UPS uniforms. In fact, we are supposed to turn them in when we retire.
     Could I wear a UPS coat after I had “punched out” for the last time? I don’t know, it may not be worth the risk. What if I got caught? Would I be disciplined? The Brown Police are everywhere.
      But then again like I always used to say, “what are they gonna do, fire me?”