Picking Up Mail

   I do admire creative mailboxes along my rural road. Mine, however is plain green because I use it as a place to park my bike rather than a work of art.

Some mailboxes catch my eye because of the color, especial with surrounding flora and fauna.

                                                 Others are just darn cute and make me smile.

  Mailboxes can become the center of a larger work of art. I wish I could find a picture of my father's gnome sculpture which he placed on top of a stone pedestal. The gnome mailbox was part of a series of seven dwarfs he sculpted which he placed in different places in our yard. Can you believe that the gnome was stolen one night, pried off it's base. It must have weighed 100 pounds.

   I should ask my mailman if he enjoys delivering mail to the more creative folk in our neighborhood.

    I've started collecting some pictures of unique boxes to please my sense of the whimsical.

My brother was a mail carrier and I so enjoyed his stories about the people on his route. He knew a great deal about their lives from talking to them but also from the kinds of mail they received. There was a special bond he developed, often becoming the neighborhood watchman. 

    I still watch for my mail everyday and though 75% is junk I get excited for the occasional letter from family and friends. Maybe my blogger friend Diane is right. She invited us to try going back to the snail mail of yesteryear. Hmmm.