Pop-up Card Caper

MYSTERY

The great pop-up card caper

There were two blue envelopes in my mailbox. Yes, I still have a mailbox. And yes, I still occasionally get letters, although most often it is the printout of a bill the bank has already paid for me.

To get back to the blue envelopes. I knew without looking they were from John in Aiken, SC. Every year he makes an elaborate Christmas tree and since we were in Aiken one year we had to go and admire his masterpiece. It was Disney themed. My granddaughter, then aged three, identified all the characters, as well as, much to his surprise, the Mona Lisa on a pillow. Now that we are oceans apart, his usual Christmas cards are generally pop-ups that I always save. There’s one with a three dimensional dove, one with an olive tree. Must remember to get those from past years out. That is if I know where I put them.

Two blue envelopes, one addressed to me, one to my son. I open mine. No pop-up. Just a lovely hand-written note on a Christmassy note paper with a stylized Snowman Santa at the top. Good news from John and how he will be at the farm for the holidays, although he generally writes me email. I note it took the card 13 days to get here to me in Italy. Not bad.

I look at the postage – just over $3.Then I look at the postage on the envelope for my son. $1.79. Strange, I think. My envelope was so much lighter. I look at the reverse of the envelopes. My son’s is sealed normally. Mine has bit of scotch tape. Aha! There must have been something else in mine to make it that much heavier, warranting almost twice as much postage. This is soon confirmed, via email, and indeed there was supposed to be a pop-up card in mine.

Someone, American or Italian, will remain unknown, saw a nice fat envelope with postage of over three dollars. Wonder what’s inside they thought. Probably a present of some sort. They would have furtively looked around to make sure no one was watching as they opened it. And they must have had scotch tape available for opportunities like this, not the first time they opened a letter not addressed to them.  Evidently, although there was no expensive present, they decided to keep the pop-up card they discovered. You’d think they would have put it back in the envelope. All I can say is hope they enjoyed the card.  Happy holidays!