NATCHEZ — For many the workday is a time filled with nonstop hustle and bustle.

But Sybil Alford views her day as tranquil.

Alford is a rural letter carrier for the U.S. Postal Service.

Each morning she loads her Jeep with bills, packages and letters and takes to the county’s back roads to make her deliveries.

“It’s peaceful,” she said. “There’s no one always looking over your shoulder.”

Alford said her typical route takes her all over Adams County as far out as Sibley.

And when she’s in the Jeep it’s just her and the mail.

Alford said she never gave much thought to working for the postal service until she saw an ad for letter carriers in the newspaper one day.

“I just answered the ad,” she said.

That was in 1996, for the next three years Alford was on a waiting list until she was able to work as a substitute carrier. She wasn’t able to start full-time until 2004.

“It was a long time to get here,” she said.

And now that Alford has arrived she’s delivering the mail in style.

Alford is the only carrier in Adams County to deliver mail in a right-hand-drive Jeep.

Alford bought the Jeep from a dealer in Tupelo already outfitted with the steering wheel on the right hand side.

“It’s exactly the same,” she said looking into the cab of the Jeep. “Except everything is on the other side.”

Alford said she considered purchasing a conversion kit that would allow her to drive a regular vehicle from the passenger seat but it was extremely expensive.

“I figured if I have to drive it every day I’d just buy one,” she said.

And so that’s what she did.

Rural mail carriers are responsible for the purchase of their own vehicles and their insurance.

But for Alford the price of the vehicle is worth it.

“I like to just be out there on my own,” she said.

While solitude is part of what Alford said she enjoys about her job, she’s not totally alone on her route.

“There’s always the customers,” she said. “You always have to do your best to give them good service.”

And Alford said most of the people she encounters on her route are extremely personable.

She said a stranger recently stopped to change her tire when she got a flat somewhere in the county.

“And it was raining,” she said. “I couldn’t believe it.”

But people aren’t the only thing Alford sees on her route.

She said it’s not uncommon for the occasional bird to fly from a mailbox.

“Have you ever had a bird fly out a mailbox and poop on your dashboard?” she asked.