Raymond Okafor

Raymond Okafor carried mail for the United States Postal Service for thirty-five years, walking the same routes in Cleveland long enough to watch neighborhoods change and come back again. He retired in 1999 and turned his full attention to fishing, rising before dawn on weekends to drive to the lake with a thermos and no particular agenda. He knew every postal carrier on his old route by name for years afterward. He was a quiet man who kept his word about small things and large ones equally.