Milkman’s daughter

By Mary Sharry
Sun staff writer
Milk was our conspiracy. We would meet at the refrigerator for swigs right from the bottle, which he could do neatly. It was difficult for a seven-year-old. The milk dribbled down my chin or ran from the corners of my mouth.

My father had a milk delivery route. In his blue striped overalls and dairyman’s cap he could carry six one-quart milk bottles at one time, three in each hand. He would make his way from truck to doorstep and back carrying full bottles and returning with the empties. None of my friends’ fathers could perform such a feat. Dressed in gabardine suits they rode the bus downtown to their jobs as office clerks or bookkeepers.
My parents had no compunction about letting me stay home from school to ride his milk route with him. He would overturn a milk carton thereby making a little seat for me on the floor beside where he stood. From my vantage point on the floor I saw nothing but trees and utility wires as we geared through the city streets.
My father drove his truck while standing. If there was a seat for him in the truck, I don’t remember it. The truck smelled of milk and axle grease. The gear shift, a black rod with a knob on the end, came out of the floor and rattled and vibrated, or stuck. The truck would lurch. The wooden milk cases rattled.
There were two things I liked best about the milk route. One was the wealthy neighborhood where the giant elms lining the streets towered over stately mansions. At one such home the owner delighted in having me come into his kitchen while my father put the man’s dairy order—cottage cheese, butter, and milk—directly into the refrigerator. The kitchen was tiled in a pale shade of green, and on one counter there was a malted milk machine. My weakness! Malted milk. I could drink one down in about two minutes, and didn’t mind the consequence of an ice cream headache every time.
The other part of the route that delighted me, but always got my father in trouble with my mother, happened after our return to the dairy. He’d unload his truck. The empty bottles were carted to the conveyer system for washing. Inside the building the air smelled warm and sweet. The floor had been hosed down with a spray of steamy water. We splashed our way to the dairy bar at the front of the bottling plant. There we were served the best cheeseburgers and malted milks. Well, after a day of riding and bouncing in the truck, my appetite was enormous. My father could down two cheeseburgers and drink a malt and then go home to our more humble dinner of, say, cream chipped beef on mashed potatoes, or baked beans and brown bread. I would pick my way around the beans, flattening them with a spoon or use my fork to draw pictures in my potatoes. My mother would glare at my father. “You let her drink a malt before supper, didn’t you?” He’d grin and explain how healthy those malts were.
His milk route brought him down our street, and sometimes he would stop in front of our house to run in to use the bathroom. The thing was, our street was also served by another dairy, one that still used a horse to pull the milk wagon. The driver of this wagon was an old man named Orville. His timing was such that he would have passed through our neighborhood before my father came along. Orville would halt his horse and wagon right alongside our curb to make a delivery to the other side of the street. The animal usually chose that time and location to deposit his horses d’oeuvres, as my mother would say.
My father would drive up shortly after Orville had gone. There was the pile of manure. Even if I were playing out in our backyard I could hear him holler, “Stinks to high heaven,” and “Orville,” followed by “damned horse.” My father had bounded from his truck unmindful of the droppings. If he caught up with Orville and complained, Orville would snap right back and tell my father where he should park his truck.
Aside from the grace it took of him to enliven his work shoes, my father was truly athletic. He could make a delivery on the run from truck to porch and back again while his truck, in gear, rolled down the street. To my knowledge he neither missed a doorstep nor failed to catch up with the truck. I never saw a broken milk bottle.
Today, thanks to a certain dairy, I can again pour milk from a bottle. I savor the taste, and though the little cardboard cover has been replaced by a foil cap, the experience is rewarding. I still have not mastered the art of the swig. My milk moustache attests to that.