Is That For Me?

www.jcgparts.com

I went to the post office this morning after being out of town for two and a half weeks.

I was terrified. 

I had convinced myself that I would swing open the little door on our P.O. box, and the Postmaster General would be on the other end with a shotgun barrel pointed in my face.  Two and a half weeks is a long time for them to try to cram our mail into something the size of a milk carton.   I opened it this morning with that face that you only use when you open a can of comedy worms or when you lift a lid off of what you simply know is a culinary disaster.  Terror meets embarrassment.   So it was to my joy and relief today that upon opening the tiny door, there it was – no gun, no Postmaster, no horror – just mail.  I’m sure that I barely skirted the arrival of the dreaded trifecta  though, because I don’t think that even a wizard could have packed more paperwork into such a small space.  The no vacancy sign was lit.  

There was no more room in the inn. 

One thing I love about our post office, besides being small and forgiving, is their resourcefulness.   When your P.O. box fills up and you receive a package in the mail, they don’t even bother trying to hold it for you on a shelf in their workspace, or in a bin behind their desk.  Perhaps it’s because there are others like us living here that are fairly migratory (which I’m sure would drive them absolutely mad, were they to wait for us), but these good government employees have devised a beautiful system to ensure that everyone stays happy, including them. 

In reality, the scheme was probably devised to hold the overflow of mail for folks who, due to the rising temperatures, are just now starting to emerge from the forest.  But it serves us all.

So, I got a package, perhaps two full weeks ago, and what these clever employees did was put it in another box.  How cunning!!  I use my key to open our box, only to see (hidden amidst the madness) another key.  I take this key and bring it to another box (this one much, much larger), and open it to retrieve my package.  This key remains locked in its keyhole, and after a postal worker retrieves it, the whole process begins again for another citizen.  It’s magic!

This is one of those things that makes me want to be a postal worker, if only to get to hold

                           all

                             those

                                 keys.

I bet it would feel like you were a king.  The P.O. Box King. 

And I bet nothing could match that feeling.

www.spartanmail.uncg.edu

Except maybe being the Safe Deposit Box King.  But only that.