Mike The Milkman

Being different can make a difference

When I was a little kid we had a milkman. To those of you too young to know what a “milkman” was, once upon a time milk and other dairy products were delivered to your home. The milk came in glass bottles that you returned to the milkman when they were empty. No one talked about recycling or saving natural resources. It was just the way things were done. You kept your empties outside your door, and you may have had a metal box for storing the latest delivery. Nobody stole someone else’s milk. It just wasn’t something you did. The milk was pasteurized but not homogenized. The cream at the top of the bottle was used for coffee.

However, our metal box didn’t get used much, because my grandmother was always home, and our milkman was Mike. He was our friend. He’d knock on the door of our rundown railroad flat, and my grandmother would invite him in for a cup of percolated coffee. Mike wore a big smile, and he seemed friendlier than other grownups somehow. When I’d see him at the door I always thought he was there just to see me. I never had to work at getting his attention. As a special treat, I’d dunk a cookie in his cup of coffee, which was heavy with sugar and cream. (In hindsight, I wonder if he truly preferred his coffee that way, or if he lightened and sweetened it for my inevitable dunk.) 

I’d show him whatever I was playing with, and he’d commiserate with my grandmother (whom he always addressed as Mrs.) on body aches or rising costs or whatever it was that grownups talked about. Sometimes, I suppose when one of them shared bad news, Mike stared out the window, baffled yet philosophical in a way that hardworking, uncomplaining people often are.

I had surgery when I was four or five, and my mother came down with an acute case of overprotectiveness. She wanted me to stay indoors far longer than the doctor required. My grandmother, whom we called Granny, thought this ridiculous, so when my mother left for work she’d coax me to play outside. However, my mother learned about this, and told me that no matter what Granny said I was not to leave the house. Looking back, I realize the conflict between them was about much more than this one issue. But at the time I simply was confused by these mixed messages from grownups.

However, Granny knew that the one person I’d listen to was Mike. I don’t recall verbalizing how much I loved him, but Granny must have seen the obvious. I can still see Mike looking right at me, saying how much fun it was to run around and play outdoors in the fresh air. As always, it seemed like he stopped everything to talk to me—that nothing mattered more.

It’s hard to remember exactly, but I think over the next few days Mike’s words of wisdom sunk in, and I started playing outside. I already was a secretive, mischievous child who did any number of things I wasn’t supposed to do. But it was always me against everyone else. This was different. It was a mini rite of passage. The matter of my existing in the world beyond my family became an official problem. For the first but hardly the last time in my life, I was expected to choose between two mutually exclusive sides.

When I was six my mother remarried, and we moved away. Granny did not approve of the marriage, and on a certain level, it was as though my mother and grandmother got a divorce. I recall being disappointed when we started buying our milk in a carton at the supermarket. I have no idea what happened to Mike, but I like to think he missed me and thought of me as I missed and thought of him.

Years later, I mentioned Mike to an older relative, and I found out that Mike was a hunchback. I realized that I found him so easy to talk to because the curvature in his spine put his head closer to my little kid level.  And yes, he truly was a warm, nice guy. But it’s that effortless eye contact I remember the most. Maybe part of what made us close was that I didn’t see him the way other people did. I just knew he was accessible in a way other grownups weren’t.

Talking to me about the adventures of the great outdoors had to have been, at best, a melancholy moment for him, but he never let it show. I wonder if he lived alone and if he had family or friends besides us. I wonder if he spent much of his life being made fun of.

He was only the milkman and I saw him for probably about ten minutes a week as a young child. Yet he permanently touched my life. Mike played a role in my learning how to make decisions, and he taught me that being different didn’t mean being inferior to other people. Different can be better. Of course, I realize the latter lesson only in retrospect.

At the time, he was just my pal Mike.