Mailbox Anticipation

When I bought my house last year there were several things that needed repair, the most obvious (to my neighbors anyway) was my mailbox. The darn thing had a rusty nail jammed into the bottom of the mailbox and into a worn hole hole on a post. There were days when I would come home to see it lying on the ground. I learned that some of my neighbors on their daily walk would put it back up on the stump, even the dear post man would get out of the jeep and put it back on. There was a mix of excitement a year ago as I waited first for my fingerprint appointment and waited even more anxiously for my 171H. I badly hoped that my box wasn't lying in the snow or dirt on the magical day that my form would arrive. I got lucky.

Last summer my parents and I were quite happy to yank that bad boy out of the ground! My dad replaced that sad box with a brand new box--a box that should stand up to any beating the neighbor girl gives it (yeah, that was part of the reason it had issues. I found her beating my box last year with a big stick until it would fall off). In fact, I dare the punks to swing a baseball bat at my mail box--that thing is deeply cemented into the ground and on a solid wood post with the full sized mailbox over it.

I only say all that because each day the excitement is building for me--perhaps even more so than last year because I don't have to think about the mailman missing my box because it was lying in the snow. I rushed home today hoping, just hoping, that my fingerprint invite would be there. The near failure of last year is pushed to the back of my mind. Maybe it is true, mothers get amnesia when it comes to birthing their babies. They remember all the good stuff and not the 36 hours of labor and breech delivery. "Let's do it again" they say. I think I understand why. I need to remind myself that it has only been a week since my homestudy was completed and mailed off.