Mailbox Waltz

I have this dream that I take the key from the living room cupboard and creep in my loose pajamas to the mailbox. It is December 30, and I am not thinking about envelopes. But I am turning the key because I am looking for something. Perhaps to expand a joke made about Pandora's box and how an unopened mailbox is like a deadly secret.

The contents inside this little grey box that I walk to on a daily basis are a mystery. An adolescent fixation, an early bird special--the feeling of being the first person to unwrap the local paper. From the sidewalk to your in, end, is a welcomed ritual.

In this dream of mine, I'm walking with cold feet, clammy hands and the same raccoon eyes I have after sleeping with someone, someone I shouldn't name and rest my head upon. This walk is the one chance I have to separate. The key feels like hope in my hand. This grey day is all black and white except for this key that shimmers like the gate of heaven. The box glows with eternal hope.

I turn.

I turn again.

I make a circle and pull at its door.

Inside are ads, pizza ads, insurance claims, models with smiling faces wearing the newest line from Target and JC Penney. And then, the third item from the top is a blue folder with three stamps. I can't make out the sender's address. I'm reminded of an old Elvis song and get the warm sort of feeling I used to get when getting birthday cards in the mail from relatives out of state.

My hands shiver with excitement. The inner crowd pushes forward, screaming for some literary base. Hungry for words scratched onto a note inside this plain blue envelope that traveled miles and miles for this very walk. My fingers act as a knife. Like a sliver, I slit the envelope from ear to ear with a serial killer's fervor. A guilty pleasure.

Inside I see a to then skip down to see who it's from. The same unrecognizable hand. A name I can't read. But needless to say, the content of this letter is brief. Like a sign from a billboard driving down an empty highway with only one light shining. No marriage proposal, no important announcement, no one's died, I'm not getting a raise, and I don't have a secret admirer pining in a roach infested cabin in the mountains of Maine. No mountain man mam but a note with one word.

One word alone. A sharpie went to town and wrote in big bold strong black print. Two letters.

Go.

GO is how it reads.

I drop the letter.

The mailbox swings shut. A neighbor slams his door. My lover rolls on his side. My coffee pot finishes its brew. A car cranks. A school bus beeps to reverse. A rifle is shot. A police car zooms by--on a mission to submission. An ambulance pulls out its gear from the back. Oxygen mask, stretcher, looking for its victim to strap. Paper ruffles, mp3 player shuffles as the disciplined man begins his morning run. A baby cries and the mother wipes at her wrinkles, only to find they haven't disappeared. A widow lays in bed, ten minutes longer than yesterday, not sure when to begin and or how to end the past that won't return.

All in a blue envelope.