Through the Eyes of a Delivery Goddess |
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That one worked! .... The advertising. How many decades ago did someone come up with the advertising campagne of "a Kodak Moment." Everyone old enough to comprehend knows what that means. Many times out on the roads, I've been so sorry that I didn't have a camera along. I'm sure you've all had those thoughts, too ... "Gee, if I'd have only had a camera." Years ago, when David and I lived on the third floor of an apartment building, I called the office and told them we had squirrels living in the attic above us. They told me I was crazy, there was no way a squirrel could get into the attic. We lived along the edge of North Park, and wildlife was plentiful. I told the office that squirrels used to climb the tree along the edge of the woods about twenty feet from the building - hop over to the telephone pole and balance along the electric wire that then connected to the side of the brick building. They would hop off of the wire and run back and forth along the cement window sill on the outside of our office window, climb around on the screen for a few seconds and then find their way into a hole in the soffit right above our window, and ultimately into the attic.  After several calls to the office, I finally took down a picture of the squirrel clinging to the outside of our screen. Mouths dropped to the floor. Maintenance men were in our attic within the hour. They knocked on my door later in the day and said they guessed the squirrels had been storing up for months - it was an oozy, sticky mess of nuts and leaves all over the attic. They patched the hole, and tried to clean up the mess the best they could. They thanked me, and asked for a copy of the picture. I dropped several off at the office a few days later.One night delivering pizzas at around 10pm, I passed a nice, single-story brick home with a cement pad front porch. I would guess the porch was close to five feet wide and eight feet long. There was a table on the porch with a couple of chairs, and what looked like a bowel of fruit sitting in the middle of the table. The porch light created a dim light, so I am not certain what was in the bowel, but I GUESSED it was probably plastic fruit. There were two deer standing at the corners fartherest from the porch light, both with their noses in the bowel on the table. What a picture! If there had only been cell phone cameras back then! Of course, my cell phone never takes good pictures at night, but I sure would have LOVED to have had a camera for that Kodak Moment. One morning at daybreak while delivering papers, I passed a young gal walking a mid-sized dog on a leash. I had to go around the block to double check, but even on the second pass, it looked like the medium dog was holding the leash for the smaller dog in his mouth, rather than both leashes being held by the owner. As I made the loop around for the confirmation glance, it would have produced a great picture... if I'd have had a camera. Another Kodak Moment. About three weeks ago at about 4am, I was driving up a driveway in Crybaby Condos. The rear unit was the paper customer, and they always have bird feeders strewn about their front yard and porch. I had not seen it before, and have not seen it since, but I counted nine squirrels scattering away from the main bird feeder as I got close to the house. The feeder hangs from the pole lamp about five feet away from the front porch,so I got a good look at the squirrels scurrying up the brick pillars on the porch and the shrubbery planted in front of the porch. I believe that would have been a Kodak Movie-Moment. This morning while delivering papers in a housing plan around 6am, a quick movement to my left caught the corner of my eye. The house is perched on a small hill, there are about ten steps climbing from the driveway to the front door. There are six or seven steps parallel to the front of the house, then a landing, and two more steps make a ninety degree turn toward the front dooor. There is a light pole right at the corner of the landing. Under the light pole, standing almost as tall as the pole itself, was a very large deer. He looked as if he was standing at the top of the steps waiting for a ride. I stopped and drifted backward while grabbing my cell phone to turn on the camera. However, the sudden stop spooked him, and he took a few steps backward into the shadows and even though I could see him, my cell phone would never had picked up his image clearly enough to be worthwhile. Another Kodak Moment wasted! Perhaps Santa will bring me a cheapie camera to carry in my car so that I can more accuratly report the Curbside Etiquette articles, complete with visual aide. |