The third-generation rural delivery contractor is in her 15th year on the job.
''I drive 250km a day, six days a week, and have 280 customers.''
The biggest Balclutha-based rural delivery run, RD 2 covers the wider Hillend area north of Balclutha, Benhar, and some houses on the Kaitangata Highway.
Mrs Carson's father was a rural delivery driver on the original Hillend run, and her maternal grandfather also did the same run.
''My father took crook at one stage and my brother and I just had to do the run, because he was in hospital.''
Her two brothers - one a farmer, the other a digger driver - did not want to take over the run when their father retired, so Mrs Carson took it over.
''I was last choice, really.''
Her day starts at 5.30am, with the sorting of mail and parcels for the run, which could sometimes take nearly two hours.
''A lot of people don't realise we sort our own mail. They think it's all there ready for you and you just walk out the door with it.''
For the next seven or eight hours she delivers almost everything from letters, newspapers, parcels, and medicine, to flowers.
Rural delivery contractors deliver a lot of parcels and couriered items.
''There are heaps now [with] ... people buying online. You pay $6 and get something delivered from wherever and it's here overnight. If it [mail delivery] goes to three days, there's no way it'll get here overnight.''
Some customers relied on rural delivery drivers for medicine from the chemist's, as well as vet parcels for stock and pets.
''Today, someone had asmoked fish. Lucky I'm not doing three days' delivery, even though it was smoked.''
New Zealand Post is proposing to amend the postal service's minimum service obligations, which could see mail delivery reduced to three days a week. Submissions on the proposal closed last week. Mrs Carson said a three-day mail service would have a ''huge impact'' on rural customers who relied on rural delivery contractors for more than just letters.
A three-day service would also mean rural delivery contractors would have more mail and parcels to deliver, taking up more space. It would also make it difficult for each run to be a viable business, she said.
With a lot of the run made up of gravel roads and bumpy farm driveways, a four-wheel-drive vehicle is a must. Of the four Balclutha-based runs, the Hillend run is also the worst for snow.
''Getting stuck in the snow makes for a bad day. I got stuck ... for the first time last year ... a customer towed me out with a tractor.
''Some days you can get three days' worth of papers, and that's horrendous, in itself. They're talking about doing every second day for mail - people just wouldn't get the papers. Why would you want a paper several days old?''
The Otago Daily Times is delivered six days per week, to 4800 rural subscribers each day throughout the rural delivery service.
With nearly 15 years' experience under her belt, Mrs Carson said she still enjoys the mail run, even though she once found a dead rabbit in a letterbox.
''People say to you that it's the same thing every day. But it's not, because you see different people. Even the kids come out to see you ...''
While Mrs Carson's daughter fills in for her when she is on holiday, she is not sure if the run will carry on for a fourth generation.
The Clutha District Council made a submission to New Zealand Post opposing a proposal to amend the postal service's minimum service obligations which could see mail delivery reduced to three days a week. It says the council believes the proposals particularly concern residents on rural delivery routes, where the daily service is ''about more than just mail''.
The council accepted mail volumes were decreasing because of the increasing use of technology, but said a substantial portion of Clutha's rural communities did not have, ''and some may never have'' reasonable broadband access.
