Mail Call

As you know -- or have guessed from previous blogs -- I am the "go to" person around here when it comes to getting the mail. This is not your easy job of opening the front door and lifting a flap on a box mounted right beside the door. Nor is it walking to the end of the porch. It is going out the back door (this is country, and NO ONE uses their front door) walking the depth of the house down the uneven flagstone walk until it turns into a mud path, then coming out of the lee of the house into the strong cross wind, walking past the black walnut tree and the attendant walnuts that lie in wait to cause a sprained ankle, down the proverbial slippery slope to the roadside box.

This is the same box that a friend ran into a few months ago, rendering it hard to open and harder to close. Opened, it often reveals an armload of mail -- mostly ads, requests for donations, catalogues and bills. Why so much mail?

Husband in his retirement has discovered the joys of donating to worthwhile causes, buying inexpensive gadgets which promise to make our lives better, and supporting my gardening habit by ordering plants for me. There are times when I wish he were less magnanimous with his largesse -- because I have to bring in the mail.

Yesterday, we got a Christmas card from Rosalynn and Jimmy Carter and an autographed picture of Hillary Clinton -- along with many items to be sent through the catalogue-ordered paper shredder mentioned in an earlier post.

(Someday I'll write about the loneliness of being a Democrat in Tennessee.)