Going Postal

Dear US Postal Service,

I moved nearly a month ago and haven’t been receiving any forwarded mail.  Neither has my new roommate. We think you might be holding it hostage.  In my attempt to investigate the issue, I have come to realize why people favor online bill pay, Kindles/iPads and FedEx over the USPS.  Here are ten reasons why I am not surprised you are bankrupt or close to it:  

1. I have been to and/or called five different USPS numbers and locations in order to track down where my mail might be.  Everyone points me to someone else.

2. Several of you keep telling me it takes at least three weeks to start getting forwarded mail. Well, it’s been three weeks. 

3. And why the hell does it take three weeks anyway? I moved not even two miles away!

4.  I had to pay $1 to change my address on your website. 

5. I’m still waiting for the Easter card my mom mailed me in 2010. You’re the reason she no longer sends me things in the mail because she’s afraid you’ll lose them.

6. The person who answered your customer service line yesterday sounded drunk or like he just woke up and was sitting on his couch eating donuts or playing video games. I’d at least expect the person who answers the USPS 1-800 number to sound like they’re not distracted by something else when I ask my questions.

7. When I tried to call my old post office – which closes at 5 p.m. probably on purpose so normal people can’t go in and ask questions – the phone was off the hook and giving me a busy signal at 4:51 p.m. yesterday.

8. The post office I ultimately needed to call is not even listed on your website.  I got the number from a friendly (gasp) USPS worker at a different USPS location.  

9.  I know I’m just one of many millions of people that receive mail every day, but my mail is important and I would appreciate a little compassion.

10.   All I really want is new issue of Runner’s World (it’s the Boston Marathon memorial issue). If you can deliver this to me before June 16 so I can read it on the plane to Lisbon, I will reconsider this list.

Benjamin Franklin would be so disappointed.  Maybe it’s time to enlist Miss Cleo’s help to find my mail.   

Movin' on up and out

A couple weeks ago, I changed area codes.  I said good-bye to the only place I’ve ever called “home” in Chicago and moved to greener pastures with lots of rainbows.  Really, there are rainbows everywhere.  I moved to Boystown.

It was a very surreal period, packing up my belongings and getting ready to move. Mostly because I hadn’t had to do that in nearly four years, but I also always thought the next time I put my life into cardboard boxes, I would be moving back to Boston. This apartment was my longest residential relationship since college (I moves eight times in the four years after graduation and before moving to Chicago).

It’s crazy how time flies.  When I boarded my United flight that August night in 2009, I thought I’d be coming back a year later (even though two days later I was crying to come home). Ever since deciding to stick it out in Chicago, I’ve always played my life by ear, sometimes month by month (I guess that came with the territory being a poor grad student and then an intern for more than a year counting on false promises of a job). 

I’ve never really settled here or really put down roots deep enough that couldn’t be dug out with a month’s notice. I still don’t and won’t because I know I’ll end up back on the East Coast someday.  That’s not an if but a matter of when.  As I start to settle into my new place, I wonder if it is time to let go and just plan my life as if I will be here for a while – or at least for the next year. 

As I packed up the last of my stuff and taped the box shut, I stood in the middle of my empty room and closed my eyes (OK, I didn’t really but it sounds more dramatic).  I remember how bright and white the freshly-painted walls were when I moved in as my mom helped me stack the U-Haul boxes in the closet to get them out of the way as I unpacked – the same boxes I was stacking in the living room for the movers. 

When I bade farewell to my room, my voice echoed the same way it did when I said hello all those years ago.  We had some good, cramped times me and that room.

While it's weird to say goodbye and start over in a new place, I'm really looking forward to my in-unit washer and dryer and walk-in closet. 

I'm movin' on up.