We Almost Had No Christmas Cards

Tuesday, December 27

When we sold our townhouse and moved into the condo in May, we dutifully contacted the post office to change our address and have our mail forwarded.  As requested, we completed the online application and then sat back to wait for envelopes with yellow forwarding stickers to show up.  During the first week, a few envelopes were delivered.  And then … nothing.  Mui stopped by the post office and talked to someone at the counter to verify that our request was on file.  It was and he was assured we’d be getting our mail.

It’s not like we get a lot of snail mail anyway, so when there wasn’t much in our mailbox during the subsequent weeks, we weren’t too concerned.  Until, that is, the woman who bought our townhouse sent us an email to let us know that she was still getting mail for us at our old address.  Another trip to the post office; more assurances that the problem was resolved.

Fast forward through summer, fall, and winter.  There were plenty of envelopes showing up in our mailbox, so we assumed all was well even though the yellow-stickered ones were few and far between.  Which is at it should be, right?  After all, each time we had a piece of forwarded mail, we contacted the sender to change our address.  Well, we were wrong; all wasn’t well.

The day before Christmas Eve, we received an email from the owner of our former townhouse saying that she had a stack of what looked like Christmas cards for us!!!  A trip to pick them up from where she left our mail on her stoop was followed by another visit to the post office.  Apologies, assurances, and whatnot … but it doesn’t matter anymore; we simply don’t believe them.

Almost missed out on having any cards this year.

With service like this, is it any surprise that we have curtailed using snail mail?  Even that description doesn’t apply anymore … it’s more like “disappearing into the black hole of the USPS mail.”  From this point forward, we’ll be using the US Postal Service only if alternative options are not available.

Of course, our problem isn’t nearly as bad as Paul and Marti’s mail-forwarding woes (post here).  Lesson learned … we’ll be switching our mailing address to our South Dakota domicile well before we get on the road.  That way, we’ll still be here to resolve any issues that crop up with getting our mail forwarded to Alternative Resources, the service we plan to use while we’re full-timing.  We’re also going to personally contact any person/company of importance and provide them with our new address ourselves.  Hopefully, we’ll thus avoid any major headaches.  What’s that adage about an ounce of prevention?  Perhaps we can make it work for us.