Town Without Pity

My husband and I have lived in our little town of South Freeport, Maine for almost a dozen years. When we arrived in March of 2009 there was no mailbox at our property, and the ground was frozen under two feet of snow. Like the home's former residents, we opted to get a box at the post office half a mile away and install a proper mailbox come spring. But we liked picking up the mail every day, and even though it carried a fee, we chose to continue doing so.

Since then we have paid our box fees religiously. I have also participated in the annual tradition of neighbors supplying home-baked goodies for postal patrons every day from the tenth of December until Christmas, and occasionally throughout the year when the spirit moves me. Over time I became friends with a succession of postmasters and postmistresses, and happily gave them each a tip --sometimes cash, sometimes an actual gift -- at the holiday season.

So it was with shock and dismay that, returning from a week away, we went to get our mail and were told that our box was closed as of September 1. Any mail that arrived for us since then was sent back, marked "Return to Sender." Why? Because in my haste to get out of town, I forgot to pay the renewal fee for our post office box. That's it. No grace period. Over and out.

I think that's mean and nasty, and not in the spirit of small-town living. No other business I can think of would do such a thing. And aren't we all supposed to be trying to keep the bumbling USPS operating? We paid up and got another box, but this December I may be putting lumps of coal in that cookie tin I bring to the post office.