Sorry to go from profound to mundane, but I went to the post office tonight.
I do love the post office, because I love mailing letters. I send a lot of post cards–during Star Wars season I send a post card a day. Just because I love getting ready for the new episode, and I love sending post cards. I’m still sending them since I didn’t send up to the number I wanted to, because I got sick over New Years. Basically I tell my friends and family to message me an address, and I’ll send them a post card. Certain people care about such things.
Basically I love sending real stuff in the mail. And getting it as well.
I have a friend. She lives probably 25 minutes away from me, but we haven’t seen each other in years. I consider myself somewhat of an introvert, but she beats me at that by a mile. Every year we intend to see each other. Every year we don’t. Her birthday gift to me, then, is to write me a letter and mail it to me, because she knows I love that. My thank you is to mail her a letter.
Since it’s always this time of year, I generally write a letter to her with a bunch of stuff about me and my son and my life to catch up, and because she likes movies I send her my top ten list for the year. I do a podcast on this, but she won’t listen to that. I cannot blame her. The damn thing is more than two hours long. Which a lot of people like, but a lot of people just don’t have the time. So I write out my top ten list for her, along with a paragraph of why I love each movie, and a quote from each movie. And she really likes getting this from me every year. I write all of this by hand, because I love writing letters by hand. I do enough typing as it is.
This year’s letter was eight pages long, so I walked it into the post office because I was worried about width and weight. I was using one of the vintage envelopes my stepfather bought me last year. He got me a bunch of them from a thrift store. He’s a thrift store guy. It’s got a two-cent stamp imprinted on it. It makes an impression on the paper, and it feels really cool when you run your finger over it.
I got to the post office at about fifteen minutes before closing, and there was a huge line. It’s a small office. A small town like office. I love my post office, but it’s a little frustrating. The line crept along, and when 5:00pm came around, Jerry, one of the two workers behind the counter, locked the doors. With us inside.
He chained–with an actual thick chain and padlock!–the doors behind me near the post office boxes. It was creepy and great. And I said out loud, “This is so the set up for a horror movie.” The two dudes in front of me turned to look at me and laughed and nodded. I guess they saw the elevator movie Devil too.
The guy at the counter, the one everybody in the room hated, had five huge canvas bags with little boxes in them. He handed them over one by one. A lot of them had eBay tape on them. He handed them to the woman behind the counter, and she’d scan them and toss them over her shoulder into that cart the post office uses. Every fifth package or so he would say, “You can’t throw this one.” And she would dutifully place it in the bin. And then proceed to throw stuff on top of it. This guy had, and I counted, 95 packages that needed to be scanned. And he needed to hang out and put extra tape on three of them.
At this point you can let rage take over, or you can just choose to smile and be okay with it. I chose the latter this time.
Jerry, the other guy at the counter, would help the other people in line until a few congregated at the locked door. Then he would work his way out from the back area into the customer area and unlock the door to let those people out. Like opening a gate to let a few horses out into the pasture, but not all at once. Then he would futz about with his door key, trying to re-lock the door. This always took three or four tries.
Finally Mr. 95 was done, and Jerry waved him out. Literally waved him out. “Come on,” Jerry said. “Everybody is waiting!” The guy took his time gathering up his canvas bags and made his way out the door. His assistant followed sheepishly.
Jerry then told me, the last person in line, to meet him at his station.
“I’m just not sure of the postage on this,” I said. “It’s thick, and I think it’s more than an ounce.”
“Okay. Yeah. It’s…72 cents.”
Jerry felt the envelope for a second.
“My dad got that for me. It’s an old envelope.”
“I know. It’s pre-stamped for two-cents.” He felt the envelope, running his fingers over the impression of the stamp. He turned to the other woman working next to him. “Hey,” he said. “Feel this. It’s old. It’s pre-stamped.”
She said, “Yeah. Okay.” Not listening to him.
“No. Feel it.”
She heard him and did, and she said, “Oh. Wow.”
Then Jerry took it back and took my dollar bill. He went through the rest of my post cards and letters, and noted all the correct postage I’d already put on them at home, and said, “Good job, sir!”
“Sure. Thanks,” I said, feeling absurdly pleased with myself.
The woman working next to him said to him, “Did you get your retirement package?”
“What do you mean?”
“I got a letter saying they want me to retire. With a package for retirement. Doris got one too.”
Jerry said, “No. I wish I’d have gotten one five years ago.”
She shrugged and looked at me. “I’ll let you out.” Then she moved from behind the counter and unlocked the door.
“Thanks for your patience,” she said, meaning it.
“Thank you for yours,” I said, meaning it too.
-xtien