Never Complain; Never Explain . . . to the USPS

MICROPOLITAN DIARY

Dear Diary,

This is a cautionary tale.

The alleged animosity between dogs and mailmen is legendary. It's the stuff of jokes and cartoons.

Some years ago, there was even a dog biscuit company that sold treats in the shape of little mailmen. It was one of several shapes packaged together, and I bought them for William, who never ever barked at the mailman (or anyone else), because he liked them (and had a good sense of humor). Those biscuits were taken off the market twelve years ago, in response to complaints from mailmen.

Unlike my laid-back William, Joey barks at the letter carrier. In the year and a half that Joey and I have been together, it didn't seem to be a problem, until recently when our regular letter carrier went on vacation and a substitute was delivering the mail. With some regularity, the mail, instead of being slipped through the mail slot in the front door, was left on the top step of the stoop. Not a very secure place to leave the mail, but I got it. The person delivering the mail was intimidated by a barking dog.

Today, however, when Joey and I returned home from a visit to the vet and found the mail lying on the top step of the stoop, I decided to complain. There was no excuse this time. Joey had been with me. He wasn't at home when the mail was delivered. He couldn't have barked and frightened the letter carrier.

So, I called the Hudson Post Office to lodge a complaint that my mail was being left in a very insecure place, but, alas, my complaint only made matters worse. As a consequence of my call, my house was determined to be a "dangerous situation," because it is feared Joey will bite the fingers of anyone inserting letters through the mail slot. Mail will no longer be delivered to my home. Instead it will be held at the post office, and I have to go there to pick it up.

Whatever happened to "Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds"? Is a barking dog worse than all those things?

The moral of this story is: Never complain to the post office.

"Micropolitan Diary" is Gossips' homage to and blatant imitation of "Metropolitan Diary" in the New York Times. The term micropolitan was coined (by Gossips) because Hudson is a metropolis in microcosm.
COPYRIGHT 2016 CAROLE OSTERINK