The Birthplace of UPS

My favorite lunch spot in my new work neighborhood of Pioneer Square is the tiny park across from the store. It's called "Waterfall Park" and doesn't disappoint as there is a real live mini waterfall casacading over rocks sandwiched in between office buildings. There are tables and chairs and plenty of flowering trees - it's the perfect spot to sit and eat a bag lunch. I love it there, not only because of the wild water that has no shame in spilling right over the railings, but because its the type of public space you don't often see in Seattle - but that are everywhere in New York. One of my favorite things about my NYC temp years was my lunchtime quest to find the best place to spend my paltry lunch hour (or half hour) outside without a time-eating haul there and back. There were the steps of the church on Park Avenue. The indoor solarium with the lunchtime piano player off - was it 57th? And so many tiny be-fountained spots where I unwrapped my sad sandwiches or popped the lid to my hot and cold salad bar offerings. So this little park really brings me back. I can't believe I'm nostalgic for temping, but one thing I do love about it is getting entre into a new five block radius of the world with every job. New places to grab coffee, new lunch spots, new waterfalls.

But what you might ask of UPS? Well as it turns out Waterfall Park was built to commemorate the birthplace of the United Parcel Service. From where I sit at the reception desk I can peer across Second Avenue to the very spot where Worldwide Delivery as we know it began, here in Seattle in 1907. There is plaque on the sidewalk that tells you so as you walk past and goes on to say that the birth of the United Parcel Service is evidence of what can happen under our great Constitution of the United States. It seems like an odd trajectory from the founding fathers to FedEx, I know. But I'm willing to go with it. When you think of how brand new this place Seattle was, even in 1907, a baby-city, and that UPS wasn't started by a bunch of moguls, but by a small band of messenger boys who organized themselves on this corner of Main and Second and that now there is a tranquil waterfall to commemorate all of their hustle and bustle - I'm happy to have the Constitution claim that victory for lunchhour oasis seekers everywhere.