Mad Atoms

Man, I used to love getting mail. As a kid, if I saw the mailman I’d throw on my dad’s oversized loafers – no time for you Velcro sneakers! – and hurriedly clomp down the driveway to our bird-shaped mailbox so that I alone had the mail-retrieving pleasure. It never occurred to me that no one else cared and I was actually performing a useful service to my family, I just loved sifting through the papers, hoping, praying there might be something for lil’ me. Even in college checking my mail was a pleasurable daily routine.  

Of course when I was a kid all I ever got in the mail were comic books and Nintendo Power. In college it was Maxim (I was young and foolish - please don’t judge) and care packages from my parents. Those were halcyon days.  

Now the mailman is a harbinger of adult life’s bullshit. Insurance bills, power bills, gas bills, phone bills, credit card bills. Bank statements. Tax info. Charities I now regret giving money to wanting even more (they always want more). And volumes upon volumes of junk mail!

I get a rush of pathetic glee if I can actually open my mailbox and find glorious, glorious nothing. This maybe happens once a year.

The rest of the time it’s so overstuffed with junk that half my mail falls onto the ground before I can grab it. Shouldn't junk mail be illegal? How many rain forests has Ralph's and Albertson’s annihilated sending me grocery ads? Seriously, does anyone know how I can get them to stop delivering this shit? I've tried signing up for one of those "get me the fuck off your mailing list" lists but all it did was result in different junk mail.

Sometimes I won't check my mail for days. What's the point? I’m a broken man. Sure, I get some magazines, but that’s once a month and even then I greet many of them with a groan, realizing I’m still several issues behind in my reading. Beloved Netflix is the only thing holding my sanity together.  

At least I’ve still got packages. Even though FedEx has a ninja-like ability to appear at my door just when I’ve stepped out for a moment, that’s okay. Life has yet to figure out how to send me crushing reminders of my grown-up obligations in package form. They’re still video games, books, beer-of-the-month, and stuff from my mommy. God bless packages.