For the past two days, I've wandered back to the office smiling. Today in fact, I burst out laughing and haven't actually stopped yet.
Yesterday was a sweetly decorated envelope with an herb lady, whose skirt held my address, and a new book, just released from one our friends/writers, and fellow renaissance faire herb ladies, Sue-Ryn Burns (available from HillWoman.com).
Sue-Ryn's envelope was also beautiful, decorated with stars and fairies - but I neglected to put it in the photo.Today's surprise came from Debbie Stiffler, a fellow herbie from up north. I wasn't expecting anything, so imagine my surprise when, upon opening the box out popped Punxatawney Phil AND Phyllis,
along with a wee glycerine soap in the shape of - you guessed it - a groundhog!
I've had an on-going "relationship" with the resident live groundhogs here, and perhaps have been a little too vocal about it. Could it have been the out-of-print Jan/Feb '05 issue of The Essential Herbal where I had my brother Photoshop a groundhog into an underground jail made of roots? Was it the golden marmot (that didn't fool me, by the way, it was a groundhog) hand-puppet that my sister brought me back from Colorado last summer that I promptly and accidentally managed to burn on a lightbulb? And who now rests upon a porch newel post as a warning to other "golden marmots" who may consider living too close to me?
I will have to THANK Debra for making sure I have new ones.
In any case, so often, the mailbox holds something that makes me smile. When someone goes to the trouble to write and mail me a note to tell me they like the work we do here, it somehow touches me in a way that an email usually doesn't (although there are many, many exceptions to that rule).
I will miss Saturday deliveries if they go away. We work on Saturdays, so we'd miss it. If the entire mail system went away, it would be a tremendous loss.
Consider writing someone a letter or note. I guarantee they'll enjoy it.
