The Mail.

 A simple task, an ordinary day to day occurrence, why has it become a long walk of dread? I'm talking about walking to get The Mail each day. Our mailbox is situated at the end of our driveway. It's really not a long walk and only slightly downhill from the house and of course a bit uphill from the street. No hills are involved really, it's more of a gradual incline but does anyone really care about the details of the slope-- there you go-- it's a slope, ah, it doesn't matter! 

So why am I going on and on about the stupid driveway! It's a distraction, nothing more, something to keep me from getting to a point because that point, that awful point brings pain. The Mail.

Let's back up a bit though, and not on driveway specs- as riveting as they can be in all there up and down way. I haven't even touched on the side to side driveway aspect but I'm more than quite sure you don't want me to- there are weeds involved. You know some driveways have side to side cracks- and some even have deliberate separation lines- come on, I'm not telling you anything you don't know. Those weeds that sprout up in the driveway crack/lines are a testament to nature's ability to take over if we'd only let it. But we frown upon weeds and those driveway weeds know it. 

Did I get off track again? Back to … The Mail.

I'm biting the proverbial bullet now, or I am in a few moments, I have to mention the mailbox itself first. It's crooked. How can I describe its crookedness and do it justice? We have one of those wooden posts with a black plastic box attached to it -mailboxes…and well, it's been pushed a little bit too far to the right possibly by a vehicle, okay, almost definitely by a vehicle getting a bit too close to it. So push it back you say. Well, we do that from time to time but the mailbox likes to wander rightward in spite of our pushing ever since that initial push. 

Now, the slightly right mailbox isn't too bad, but there are aspects of the plastic black box that are bad- but they haven't been bad enough to take emergency - no mail will be delivered to this broken down mailbox- action. The mailbox has been this way for oh, a couple years now. Please, do not judge, please. I know mailboxes aren't supposed to bit broke, but…   This slightly right mailbox ALSO has a door flap that will not shut unless you push it properly, something that many a mail carrier has no time to waste doing in their daily race to get all the mail in the mailboxes. So, what happens when 79.9 %  of the mail carriers (yes, I made up that number, I'm not a mathematician by any stretch of the imagination) what happens when they don't close the mail box properly? You guessed it, the mail put inside it is vulnerable. The door flap on the mailbox is a protector from people, weather, insects, and any other mailbox intruders that exist. Without that plastic protection here in southwest Florida in the summer time especially, the poor mail has a tendency to get soaked by afternoon thunderstorms. 

Now… now a heart hurt begins, right this moment it hurts practically as if I'm outside this moment standing in front of the mailbox. He…he… Jerry, kept telling me… for the last month of his life off and on… and the words are etched so deep in my brain they are forever connected with The Mail- I can't unhear them whenever I get The Mail, I just can't. "We need to get a new mailbox." 

I didn't get a new mailbox, and I don't know why. He received several soaked pieces of mail and we all know dried out wet mail is all crinkled and just not properly flat mail. He wanted a new mail box. Why didn't I get the mailbox?! I have no answer. I just didn't think about it when I was in a store I suppose. I know eventually I would have bought a new mailbox, I would have I just didn't have it on the high priority list. I should have, I really should have, it would have made him happy. Don't get me wrong, he didn't say we needed a new mailbox every day, just occasionally. On the days the mail was wet- it was a reminder to him as well to say something.

I don't have the answer as to why I didn't get a new mailbox, I don't. And I've been told recently not to have regrets, but I do. Selfishly now for more reasons than one, I should have bought a new mailbox when I had the chance, when money wasn't as huge an issue. Is that a horrible thought to have? Maybe it is, it probably is. So many grief guilts pop up all over the place.

There's one more mailbox tidbit and I'd be remiss if I didn't mention this… the little red mailbox flag has added insult to injury and revolted some time ago- back when the mailbox was first pushed sideways a bit. It resides inside the mail box unless I need to force it to do its job when I'm mailing a letter. It's a tricky little bit of forcing and when I go out to get The Mail after mailing a letter 99.8% of the time it's on the ground because when the mail carrier pushes it down like they are trained to do, it falls off. I told you the flag revolted against its position on the mailbox. Yes, I do need a new mailbox, but now… now I don't imagine it's going to be a priority at all. If I didn't get one when Jerry mentioned it, why would I do it now? 

Do you know, I REALLY didn't intend to talk about the mailbox when I started this… I was going to talk about The Mail. I avoided that, because The Mail that I get every day of the week except one-- still thinks my love is alive and I can't bring myself to tell it otherwise. 

So, I will keep spilling The Mail tears for right now when I see your name on most of the mail, the tears- they are needed… and I will try not to look at the mailbox with too much regret. I hear his voice in my mind, in my memory, of his forever unfulfilled request- "We need to get a new mailbox." My reply was always, "Yes, we do."  So why didn't I?

God tells me to look ahead to the future and Him, not at things behind. I will pray for this specific regret to slowly fade, or at least slowly lose its loudness. 

Php 3:13  … but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, 

Php 3:14  I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.

Please, Lord Jesus, please help me to forget those things which are behind that bring regret and guilt. I know you forgive me, I know Jerry would have forgiven me. Help me to forgive myself in the small things and all things. All through YOUR amazing LOVE! In Jesus' name now and forever!!!!!!! Amen!