NEW SALEM — Wendy Flanders can expect her retirement to arrive in nine business days.

Following 40 years on the contracted New Salem route, the letter carrier is hanging up her mailbag for good on Sept. 30 and retiring from the Orange Post Office.

“Almost all my family members worked there,” she said on Monday. “So they told me when this route was up [for grabs] and I put in for it and I got it. It was great because while my kids were young I could get home before they got home from school.”

Flanders took over the route as a 29-year-old mother of four. She works six days a week, driving her Honda CR-V to about 225 stops in New Salem while also delivering to a sliver of Orange. Although New Salem’s rural, winding roads can be challenging in the snow, Flanders said she could always call the town’s highway superintendent if she got stuck.

“And in the summer it’s cooler up here than it is in Orange,” she said. “The weather is good up here.”

Flanders, an Orange resident, said she plans to relax in retirement and do some traveling. She has a trip to Niagara Falls in mind.

Mandy Richtell, the postmaster in Orange, said Flanders is popular among coworkers and will be sorely missed when she retires. A new carrier will take over the New Salem route on Oct. 1.

“She comes in every day, she’s always smiling. She makes a lot of funny jokes and has a great attitude,” she said. “Everybody here knows Wendy. Everybody here knows her and enjoys her when she’s here.”

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Richtell mentioned a lot of work goes on behind the scenes at a post office, as carriers have to sort the mail to be delivered on their routes.

“There’s a lot that goes into the mail that I think people don’t realize,” she said. “I know Wendy goes above and beyond a lot. She’s so knowledgeable about her people [on her route].”

Flanders said interacting with residents on her route, who have always treated her with kindness and respect, will be the aspect of the job she misses the most.

Reach Domenic Poli at: dpoli@recorder.com or 413-930-4120.