A New Mailbox, An Old FriendKristen called me today to tell me that Kevin had sent us a mailbox. He'd been visiting overnight a few weekends back and was here
when the car drove over our mailbox. He'd driven back to Brattleboro through Manchester and found this mailbox (at a woodworking shop on the main street that I remember well from growing up in Dorset - another evocative coincidence!). He'd also found some wooden fish of various sizes. He picked four shapes, one for Kristen, David, Sofia and me, and glued one of each shape to each side of the mailbox, labeling them with our initials. Then he packaged it up and sent it along.
I'm torn now, though; half-afraid to put it up! Since Kevin left, we've had another car off the road in the ditch, just a few yards up the hill from the mailbox. And winter's just begun. The old mailbox has no sentimental value -- I can be amused to find it under yet another car's grille. The new one, however, has all sorts of sentimental value -- despite the fact we've only had it for a few hours. It's going to really bother me to see it get run down.
But so be it. We don't put plastic covers on our furniture, and we'll let our new mailbox be true to its nature and collect mail. If it falls in the line of duty ...
Kevin mentions this incident in a
recent column for the Reformer (he's the editor), and I share the link here because it's really a terrific column. Not because it mentions me. I'm hardly a footnote. It's a powerful story that manages a fine balance of between expectation and surprise that exactly captures how life treats us.
