Yesterday I eagerly put my first batch of Christmas cards in the mail. I'm holiday decor-challenged, uncreative with gifts, and do not bake much for fear that I'll consume the fruits of my labor at an alarming rate. But I freakin' LOVE sending Christmas cards! So you can imagine my disappointment when I discovered that our weekend mailman simply shoved our incoming mail on top of my cards instead of taking them.
"But, Sam, what's the WORST that can happen when your mailman is a complete idiot?" OH, I don't know... intervention from a bomb squad?
Hear me out.
Some time last year, I had HAD it with the postman neglecting to take our mail, so we began leaving it conspicuously sticking out of our open mailbox. The good news is that he actual began to take it. The downside was that if it rained, our outgoing mail got soggy. Also, these ugly little beetles began crawling into our mailbox and dying. Yes, idiot-proofing our mail was beginning to have its downsides.
One week, my parents were visiting. We were playing with Grant in the living room when there was an unexpected knock on my door. It was a weekday morning, and I wasn't expecting anyone. I casually answered the door and was met with two burly gentlemen dressed in what looked like police-related uniforms. The expressions on their faces were full of caution as they leaned toward me and asked if my husband was home.
"Oh no," I thought. "I knew my spouse was too good to be true. What's he done? Am I going to be arrested? Thrown out of a plane, perhaps?" (Anyone ever see The Good Shepard?)
In my confused state, I explained that my husband was at work. The men, oddly enough, looked like they were now taking great pains to hold back laughter. The taller of the two reached into his bag and asked, "Did your husband recently send a letter to the US Department of Treasury?" I remembered that we had mailed some late tax-related stuff not too long ago and nodded. The man pulled out a large ziplock bag and pointed to it: "Is this the letter he sent?"
I examined the ominously torn, ink-stained letter. When I took a closer took, I noticed that it was also covered with dead beetles. The gears spun for a moment, then I put the pieces together. Mail + rain + dead beetles= poor, terrified individual at the Department of Treasury assuming we had sent a threatening letter containing some kind of deadly vermin. The officers had been sent to our house to investigate after their office had been evacuated and the bomb squad had examined the scene.
STUPID MAILMAN, THIS WAS ALL HIS FAULT!
Fortunately the officers did not feel that I, my parents, or my toddler son posed any threat. They also took my husband's clearly written name on the return address as a sign that maybe it was all just a big understanding. They began to laugh even harder than I was. When I asked if there was some kind of paperwork I needed to fill out, they laughed and said no. Which I took to mean: "No, but we will now have you and your family under cautionary surveillance for the next two decades."
So, yes, having a mailman who doesn't do his job can be a legitimate problem on occasion... But who do I send my letter of complaint to?!
")
