She called me to come out because she had discovered that once again our mailbox had been knocked off the post. We couldn’t tell much in the dark, but I reached through the now gaping holed back of it and pulled out the bits of mail, and we left it as it was until better light.
When we came in, I called the neighborhood security number and reported. The guard was startled at the news, and quickly told me that they no longer did the neighborhood patrols as that was now a task the local police had taken on. Great. He did take some information to file a report.
After I got Snowy to bed around 5 today, we went out to really look at the box to see if it could be fixed. There is no way as the metal has been sheered from all the connecting parts. We lifted it back up on the remaining back plate, which is fastened to the post, for now since the box is what has the house number on it, and the mailman also won’t stop if the box isn’t there.
We learned that when earlier in the year our box was likewise a victim. That was the original box — that looks like a ‘normal’ mailbox on a wooden post. It is mandated that all the mailboxes in the neighborhood are alike. This first episode had the mailbox knocked off and greatly dented and the wooden post split. No other mailbox around us was damaged and the cause and causer was not apparent. It was really inconvenient, but the box was eventually replaced.
After that, a planned replacement of all the neighborhood’s mailboxes was made a few months ago. Someone had picked out more ‘classy’ boxes with metal boxes and posts and the project took a few weeks to be made throughout and numbers put on.
We had even put tiny red reflection dots on the ‘newsletter’ box that was incorporated under the mailbox to make it easier to spot our house in a neighborhood where it is easy to get turned around and miss your lookalike house.
Last night we heard nothing. Chick and I were obviously up, we had lights on (not outside, but you can tell from outside when lights are on inside). We heard nothing.
There is no logical reason for this happening — wasn’t one the first time or this time. The road is straight and doesn’t curve anywhere near us, there weren’t cars parked in the street that would have forced someone to swing out of the lane. The driveway across the street didn’t lend itself to creating problems with someone backing out.
With the mailbox perched on the post plate I was able to look a bit more ‘investigatively’ at it. The hit, whatever it was, came from West to East (which would put the person on the “right” side of the road). There’s one scrape on the box itself, but at the top of the post, on a decorative ‘ball’ feature, there is an incongruous scrape that is both yellow and red.
Curious. Strange. Annoying.
Don’t know why it happened; don’t know why it happened before. Don’t know why who ever did this didn’t come knock on the door to take accountability. Don’t know HOW it was done. Don’t know why it was us, a 2nd time. We are nearly invisible neighbors and don’t have other than pleasantry-interactions with others in the neighborhood, so it makes no sense that we would be targeted and no one else was.
Which leads it back to being some kind of accident — but HOW? Who? Why not come say something.
Just something that makes one feel less safe in an environment we count on to be safe, a haven.
Thank you for leaving me your thoughts!