Mail and Fee-mail

This has been quite a week for me. For the enlightenment of those who don't already know, I've just bought a new house. Well, actually it is a very old house with enough dirt left inside its walls that if I trained the hose in through one of the windows I could cause a large enough mudslide to take out Tassie's north end. Why do folks live in such squallor? Gee. It's not like it's African mudbrick or anything interesting. Cleaning up after the last owners is a trial, especially since I left my last house spotless. I hate housework at the best of times. The double dose in one week has my fingers pruny. (And everyone knows that prunes are only good with rice pudding.)

Also this week I had my birthday and turned really old. You know, that secret figure in your head that you consider is an old person. Yeppers. I turned that on Sunday. I spent the day scrubbing, vacuming and siliconing my leaky bathrooms and kitchen. Hey, I had to get the work done before this ancient body decays and slips into total ruin. Parts of me are already heading south, and from Australia that means Antartica. Brrrr!

Anyway, when my family didn't bother with my birthday I presumed no one would. Then one fantastic CP sent me an amazing gift- membership in RWA. You read that right! She believes in me and in my writing that much. Yes, I sobbed. I am blown away and humbled by the generous gesture. I still can't quite believe it and only hope I can live up to the faith she has in me and make her proud. You better believe she's going in the dedication of my first print book. As soon as this horror move is done, I'll make the most of that RWA membership. (as God is my witness) First I'll go for my pro pin and maybe even turn contest whore for a time since I can now enter them freely. Well, free with a lot of entry fees, anyway. Somehow I doubt the house will leave much in my pocket for entry fees, but I'll have to squeeze out dollars for a few at least. And when those contest entries come back full of glowing praise (cough, cough) I intend to be standing at the mailbox to recieve them, ready to be fortified by the outstanding results and gushing comments.

Which brings me to the leading topic of my post. Today an irate mailman beeped outside my door while I was inside half-drowning in cleaning products. Seems I don't have a mailbox and he didn't know where to shove my letters. Given they were bills, I was tempted to tell him where to shove them, but I smiled sweetly and told him I'd have a box up by tomorrow. Another job to keep me from writing this week. I just presumed a house came with a mailbox, same as it has doors and windows. Maybe I've been spoiled. Sigh.

But the whole surprise birthday present and missing mailbox thing got me thinking. How often do we take things for granted, so much so that we don't even look to check they're there. Seems I've made a lot of faulty assumptions. Now I'm finally opening my eyes and seeing things around me more clearly. Just cause you expect something to be there doesn't mean it will be, and just because it seems something is lost, doesn't mean some precious soul won't help you find it again. Not everything is how we think it. Perhaps with my advancing years I am finally gaining new insight. That's almost worth growing old for.