Count My Blessings
I don’t know when Count My Blessings retired, but I am NOT GETTING rid of it any time soon. Well worth your trying to find it on eBay, as much as I dislike eBay.
My next project will be a card made with this stamp set, including the sentiment! Of course, if you’re one of my customers, you already have received the blank card in with your catalog shipments, along with the dimensions.
Which reminds me … if you’re a customer of mine, you already know about my card making adventures since moving to Sun City last year. I no longer have live teaching events outside Sun City, so I have started my own version of Cards In The Mail.
I’ve talked a lot about how big of a blessing it to receive a hand made card in the mail, both for the card, as well as for the note or letter included.
Today I want to let you know what a certain hashtag stamp you may have seen on the social media posts: #LettersForHenry.
Henry was a postman out in Washington State. He left work early one day in December, and his body was found in January. I heard about the story from a friend who introduced me to Henry’s daughter.
I don’t know Henry, but I know my postman. I have known and respected Danny in Kerrville, Kent in Pflugerville, and Alejandro here in Georgetown. Can’t say as I’ve ever really known any of my other mail carriers, but then I didn’t have time to know anyone who provided a daily service so essential to my life that I’m ashamed I didn’t express more appreciation for those who keep my day together.
You see, it’s easy to think that the invisible service providers don’t mean anything, aren’t special, and aren’t at all worth anything. But that would be wrong. Try going without trash pick up for a month. Try getting service at a restaurant without wait staff or a cook. Try getting notification of an old classmate’s passing without the mail carriers. Try getting groceries without the truckers who drive all night and live a very unhealthy life of sitting all day just so your shelves are stocked.
All of these people age, as do I, as do you. All of these people continue to do what they do because it’s their chosen task, career, source of income.
For Henry, he wanted to be a mailman since he was eight years old. While traveling with his family, he would make them stop in every little town along the road and go inside the post offices. He loved it! He grew up to take on postal work right out of school, and he lived every day happy that he could work doing a job he’d wanted do since childhood. Who else can say that?
As Henry entered his sixties, he slowed down a bit like we all do. Co-workers began to bully him about his age, about his speed, about his accuracy. It sucked the wind out of his sails, and it wasn’t just about whether he could continue to do his job. It was hard to keep up with his younger co-workers, but the bullying attacked a man’s worth.
Bullying doesn’t end in childhood. We who were bullied don’t outgrow it. Bullies continue to bully unless they have a epiphany with Jesus, or someone knocks the crap out of them.
I wish that that was how it ended with Henry’s bullies, but it isn’t. Henry left work early one day and we don’t know whether it was because he couldn’t take it any more or whether he had been fired, but Henry killed himself.
“If you treat all people as though they are hurting, you will be right 84% of the time.” Zig Ziglar
