There is something I love about a rainy, cold day. Especially if I have no where to go, no place to be. I can curl up with a book. With a quilting project. Work on a puzzle and listen to a favorite podcast. 

It was one of those days, I was reading the best book. Outside it was sleety/snowy/rainy. Unfortunately I had to run errands. I had put off the post office until the last possible day. If I did not mail birthday presents, they wouldn’t get where they needed to go in time. (One of my goals this year was to be more people-centered, so cards and gifts recognizing birthdays fell smack dab under this goal.) I bundled up in a waterproof coat and extra-tuffs and set out.

As much as I hated it, I went to Walmart and got the first half of my list done. I went to the hardware store for the other half, but left empty handed- absolutely paralyzed by the array of brown paint available!! I couldn’t make a decision. Armed with about a dozen paint samples I headed home to compare and contrast.

I was about halfway home before I looked over at the empty seat next to me and saw the packages, sitting like cheerful puppies, waiting to be sent. I had forgotten the post office!! 

When we first moved to town, our post office, the “Old Post Office,” was downtown. It was a counter in the back of tourist shop. It was at that post office that I got my first taste of living in a small town. It was about a block from the library and across the street from a little coffee shop called “Moggies, Mochas, Mugs and More.” My routine, back in the day, was to take the little girls to Children’s Story Hour at the library, then across the street for a latte and steamers. Then – if the girl’s could handle it, pick up the mail.

Old Lady Digression: Times were different “back in the good-old-days.” Our family wrote a lot. They missed us. Email and internet *were* available, but they just were not that common. People used the postal service much more often. 

Because of this we often found ourselves standing in line at the post office, it was part of our routine. One time I had a notice that we had a package to pick up. We greeted the postal worker warmly and while she processed our package I said to Laura offhandedly, “I wonder if we should get stamps?”

The postal worker looked up, smiled and said, “You don’t need to, your husband picked up stamps this morning.” I laughed and realized, this, THIS is what it was going to be like living in a small town!

In 1997, after we had lived in Ketchikan for two years my mom passed away suddenly. She had been at the post office in Pennsylvania mailing a package to us, a birthday present for Sarah. Immediately after mailing the package, she stepped out into the street and was struck by a car. Weeks later, after we were home from the funeral I went to that downtown office to pick up our mail and there was that package waiting. I cried there in that post office and someone hugged me and I cannot for the life of me remember who, but I don’t think it matters who it was, the small town hugged me, it really did.

A couple of years later, as silly as it sounds, I was sad when they decided to close that little downtown post office. We would now have to get mail in the “big post office” by A&P. At first it felt like the new post office was uninviting. Sterile. Spare design, echoey tile floors, rows of postal boxes, some large, some small, tables to sort mail and garbage bins to promptly dump junk mail. In spite of the sterile building and compact rows of mail boxes, I found I enjoy going. When you step through the glass doors into the package pick up area the vibe totally changes. It is cheerful and ALWAYS decorated for the season! Seriously. It is the most blinged-out post office I have ever been to! 

You see everyone at the post office! Today for example, Michelle was in line a couple of folks ahead of me. We chatted about an upcoming potluck and what each of us were taking. We talked about nut allergies and good books we are reading. We mailed our packages and waved good-bye. Sometimes it even means leaning on those sorting tables and getting lost in a deep conversations, packages forgotten. 

Unlike that first time buying stamps, I am used to the fact that the postal workers know me by name. I go just infrequently enough that we use the opportunity to catch up on each other’s kids. One of the worker’s sons was a close friend to Gracie and I love to hear how he is doing. The other has a son who went to school – both high school AND college with Laura, so it is always great to chat with them.

A 2024 goal of mine is to be more people centered. To stop and talk. To remember special occasions, or no occasion at all. To send texts, yes. But also to send cards. Letters. Clippings and art. Gifts and packages. To go to the post office. To chat with the lovely folks who work there. And because I am an old lady, I can chat with the folks in line, the folks I know, and even those I don’t.