There were 200 people on the back patio of Glassell Park’s Verdugo Bar, and John Ayala had a hug for all of them.
Wiping tears from his eyes as he slowly made his way through the intergenerational crowd, he recognized almost everyone in attendance — if not by name, then definitely by address.
For four decades, the 61-year-old Ayala delivered mail to their homes, and now he was finally retiring, to the great surprise of everyone, including himself. He’d been talking about it for years — working it into the many conversations he had each day with the friends he’d made along his mail route in the hills of Mount Washington, a small residential community in northeast Los Angeles.
The folks at the retirement party were glad that he would finally get some well-deserved downtime, but they were also wistful. For them, Ayala’s departure represented the end of an era when mail delivery came with a side of conversation.
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