Postal Service: Gloria Solis

For Winter Texans, Gloria Solis brings home the mail.

For more than three years, she’s handled the mail at Sun N Sun Resort, a mobile home park with more than 1,000 mailboxes.

“It’s kind of a large operation here,” she said. “It’s like a small town.”

For 26 years, Solis worked for the U.S. Postal Service in Houston, where she served as a customer service manager who oversaw 81 employees.

Two years after she retired, she was ready to go back to work.

That’s when she saw an ad for a mail clerk at Fun N Sun.

“I needed something to do to keep busy,” she said.

At Fun N Sun, Solis manages the mailroom, which serves more than 1,000 mobile homes.

“It’s a heavy responsibility,” she said. “I love the challenge and I always loved a challenge.”

From the post office, she gets mail packed in trays and tubs.

“We have to sort it and deliver it to the mail boxes,” she said.

For Winter Texans, the mail links them to their homes far away.

“They have a lot of valuables sent through the mail — important documents they need for everyday life,” she said.

During the summer, she works alone, when about 300 residents live in the park.

In the winter months, she works with three employees to sort mail to more than 1,000 mailboxes.

At Christmastime, her staff sorts through as many as 6,300 letters a day.

“It gets very busy, especially in December, when we get a lot of Christmas mail and packages,” she said.

By April, residents are packing up to go back home for the summer.

“I’ve got to make sure they have a correct forwarding address, so I go to the computer and print my labels with forwarding addresses. A lot of people need help filling out change-of-address forms when they leave,” she said. “I love helping people out.”

Submit Slice of Life suggestions to Managing Editor Lucio Castillo or City Editor Charlene Vandini at 430-6244 or charlenev@valleystar.com.