We received a Christmas card this morning - the ninth one this Christmas. It wasn’t the ninth to arrive this year - it was the tenth. We received a card from Nigel and Chris, nine months ago in March while we were in Cayman. It had been posted in November for Christmas 2009.
There is one card that I know we will receive and which I am looking out for. The problem is that these days, the postmark is either absent or indecipherable and so it will be hard to identify. I suppose that it’s machine-franked now. All that’s ever printed over the stamp are three or four wavy black lines. No words. I know where this card will come from. It will be, if I can identify it, from Middlesbrough - or perhaps Teesside.
I still have several envelopes from the sixties and seventies and on every one the postmark is clear and very easy to identify. I have cards and letters that clearly originated in Lowestoft, Chislehurst, Norwich and Finchley. They were hand marked but the franking machines nowadays are less efficient and designed differently.
The first one that I picked up is postmarked, “Lowestoft 3rdDec. 2.15 pm 1965.” If you read ‘I’m Merely Observing’, you will realise that was another example of an observation, not a moan.
The card that will come from Middlesbrough will be from my daughter’s parents-in-law. In the envelope along with the card, there will be a zillion, tiny, sparkly, reflective, shimmering, shiny little fragments - Christmas Confetti.
It’s the same every year. Irene’s got a thing about sparkle. They are so small and so light that when I pull the card out, a few million of them will come out too. Most will fall straight on to the floor but several hundred thousand of them will float away and get caught up in the small draughts and air currents of my living room, until they eventually come down to settle all over the house.
Next autumn, I will still be finding those that made it up the stairs into our bedroom and finally came to settle in the folds and creases of the duvet. They will have survived several outings to the washing machine and in June, Caroline will still be giggling as I get out of bed in the morning with one or more of them, sparkling away, stuck on to my bare bum.
Last year in a gesture of defiance and retaliation, I enclosed a few teaspoons of pure white, microscopically fine, Cayman sand in the envelope of the Christmas card that we sent to Dave and Irene. They thought it was fabulous to get a little bit of a Caribbean beach at Christmas. I wait to see what happens this year with some trepidation.
Our first card this year came a few days ago from David and Penny. A note written inside told us that having read ‘A-Z’, they were starting with the ‘W’s this year.
I wrote that it was a Christmas card that came today but it wasn’t really. It looked like one, with a quaint cottage complete with a snow-covered roof and with a robin perched on a bush in front of it. The message inside made no mention of Christmas.
It wished us,“Best Winter Wishes.” What! What!
It used to drive me mad when in Cayman at Christmas, people wished me, “Happy Holidays.” I’m not religious and even though I was baptised as an infant, I would not describe myself as a Christian but the holiday is Christmas!
Whoever they are, being offended by reading or hearing the word, “Christmas”, should shut up, concentrate on their own myths, legends and fairy tales and let the rest of us get on with our thing. (That’s another observation - but I’ll admit that it could be mistaken for a moan)
I remember that when I was young, I used to hear on the radio the last dates for posting Christmas cards to various parts of the world. This information used to start in early November and it was all part of the exciting build up to Christmas.
“Today is the last day for posting Christmas cards to Belize,” was the sort of thing I would hear but in those days I never knew anyone living abroad and so that knowledge was of no interest or use to me.
I went to the Post Office yesterday to buy stamps to put on the envelopes of cards that we are sending abroad. We are sending cards to America, Jamaica and Cayman. I hope it’s not too late.
Our local post office is tiny and only has two customer service booths but one of them is usually unmanned (womanned/personned)? I joined a queue behind fifteen people (I always count)and I stood in line for twenty-one minutes (I always time how long I queue as my knee begins to hurt after ten minutes of standing still), becoming more and more uncomfortable until it was my turn to be served.
I bought the stamps and the blue ‘air mail’ stickers to go on the envelopes. Then I sat in the car outside to attach the stamps and labels. The blue labels came in a sheet of eight and two single ones. The first one would not bond. I licked the second one. It seemed to stick but then it fell off.
“Bugger it,” I thought. “I’ve got a dud batch.” So, with a deep sigh I got out of the car and shuffled back to join the queue that was now even longer. Twenty-six minutes later I was at the counter once more, explaining my problem.
“You licked them?” I was asked.
“Yes, of course I did,” I said, tetchily. My left knee was really painful now.
“You should try peeling off the backing,” said the clerk, smirking.
Franking by machines and labels that don’t need licking. It will be stamps next.
OMG it is!
No comments:
Post a Comment