Some truths remain after holidays

Plenty of things are absolutes when the holiday season wraps itself up:

• You’ll have one glass of eggnog and wonder why you don’t drink it year-round, then spit out your second glass and swear off the stuff until you forget this all happened next December.

• The Christmas stuff you buy during the 50-percent-off week-after sales will still be there in mass quantities when the discounts drop to 75 and 90 percent in mid-January, but there won’t be any of the stuff you balked on when it was just 50 percent off. Shoulda got that Snoopy ornament.

• Something will happen with a gift being late, because we’re horrible procrastinators and/or we hilariously expect packages will be delivered on time in the worst month for traffic-slowing weather.

I’ve got plenty of late gifts coming (and, just so I’m not bragging, a few gifts to give) long after Christmas.

One gift is because a friend hasn’t got around to it yet. Another is because it got stuck in customs even though she ordered in early November. Another has been a lesson in knowing what you’re buying before you buy it.

I’ll only deal with the latter. My parents decided to send a gift card, and wanted to make sure it would be in my hands. So standard mail wouldn’t do, and neither would priority. They decided to go with certified mail. That meant I had to sign for it.

Before I say what my family has learned, let me give a qualifying statement or two. I think the world of the U.S. Postal Service. I think they’re amazingly efficient, because I sure couldn’t put a birthday card in my mom’s hand for 50 cents anywhere else. I think they’re staffed by some of the nicest people I’ve ever met. And although I know they’d still have problems anyway, their biggest obstacle is Congress, which gives it no funding but still tells it what to do — including a mandate that it fund 75 years of pensions up front.

Having said all of that, I found out something troubling about certified mail: No insurance, no guarantees. If your mail isn’t there after seven business days, you put in a lost mail request ... and if it’s still lost, the USPS will only certify that it lost your mail. They’ll probably say sorry, but policy doesn’t require they do that or even refund your $12.

The package was tracked going from my parents’ local post office in Montana on Dec. 16, to Great Falls on Jan. 17, ... and that’s it. I signed up for a text alert, hoping it would be found but knowing life would be just fine if it wasn’t.

While watching TV on Jan. 6, I got a text. My mail has been found. We assumed it went to Clovis, California, where carriers somehow failed to find me. We never guessed the next dispatch would be from ... New York City?

“Mom, I’ve got good news and bad news. The good news is, we know where it is ...”

I figure the U.S. Postal Service will give me an apology when that letter is finally in my hands, but I don’t think I really need it. I’d rather have the story of how that letter traveled across the country.

But if the USPS offers me a $12 trip to New York City, that’s fine, too.

Kevin Wilson is managing editor for the Clovis office of The Eastern New Mexico News. Contact him at: [email protected]