Going Postal

I'm currently embroiled in a bitter battle with the United States Postal Service, which has been holding my mail hostage since I left DC.

Despite the fact that I filed a change of address request in a timely and appropriate manner (I even paid a dollar!), I have yet to receive a single piece of mail at my new address. I've already filed multiple claims, spoken with several incompetent customer service agents, and spent several hours on hold. To add insult to injury, the hold "music" for the USPS info line is a message that repeats, over and over again: "Moving? File a quick an easy change of address form online and have your mail at your new doorstep within 7 business days. Just one of the many ways that the United States Postal Service is working for you..."

Riight...

It's Day 18 of the hostage crisis and I am in a foul mood.

Not getting my mail is not something that would usually twist me up in a knot. It's not as if I have some desperate need to rifle through three weeks worth of Pottery Barn catalogs and student loan consolidation offers. In fact, if the USPS really wants those things so badly, then the USPS is more than welcome to keep them. The only thing that I respectfully request is the single thin envelope from the District of Columbia Department of Employment Services containing a check for $617, otherwise known as "all the money that I have in this world."

I'm collecting unemployment this month. My new job doesn't start until December 4th and my severance package ran out on October 20th, and so for the time being, I'm officially on the dole. Thanks to the inexplicable rules and regulations of District bureaucracy, I'm not eligible for direct deposit until my second (and thank God, final) check. My first check must be a "live" check sent to my former DC address. Hence the whole change of address dilemma.

And so I'm grumpy...

I'm grumpy because I feel like a bit of a prisoner in this tiny suburban town. In a matter of weeks I've gone from being an independent adult with her own apartment and income to a completely dependent child--broke and unemployed, trapped in my parents' cold, cookie-cutter catalog house because I can't afford to go out. I already had to cancel plans for this evening and the outlook for Sunday's planned brunch & Bond fest isn't looking good. And as I sit here, moping and trying to figure out if I have enough cash left to buy a much-needed pack of cigarettes, I have to watch as my parents strut about giggling at me (ha ha Alejandra's poor and can't go out tonight) and flaunting their relative wealth (there is currently a limousine in our driveway waiting to take them into the city for some random party).

I realize that this is only a temporary situation. I know that pretty soon my check will arrive, my job will start, and I'll be out and about in the City again.

But right now, at this moment, I feel like shit...