moms are the best [alternate suggested title: motherlover]

A couple of weeks ago I came down with a cold that featured a fever and lots of snot. I complained about it to my mom, and she offered to mail me dayquil and nyquil. I took her up on the offer because even over-the-counter drugs like that are expensive here. And aleve is my pain killer of choice at home, but it’s something like ten dollars for 20 pills here. So if she was sending a package, I requested some aleve, too. We talked about how to mail it since I have a very small mailbox and my building has a keyed entry. I guessed fedex would have to ring my apartment, and if I wasn’t home I’d have to go pick it up. But I didn’t know what exactly would happen if she mailed a package USPS without requiring a signature. So we decided to test it out. The post office at home said it would take 5-7 days. Of course my cold would have eased up by the time a package arrived, but I’d be ready for the next cold.

After she mailed it, some kiwis told me that there was a good chance they’d open up a package to see what was inside of it, and that it was possible that if whatever she sent me was on a controlled-substance list, (and there are tons of things on the controlled-substance list) they might even confiscate items out of the package.

So right about seven days later, I got a card in my mailbox notifying me that my mailbox was too small for the package and I’d have to go pick it up. There are little post shops all over the city, but it’s a different type of post office that delivery people work from. So I googled the location of the post office where I’d have to go, and it was about 5k away in a nearby suburb called Ponsonby. Of course there are buses, but I take longs walks nearly every day, so I figured I’d just have an extra long walk this one day. Jesse came along for the exercise, and it took about 50 minutes of brisk walking for us to get to the post office this morning. Ponsonby is just darling and filled with colorful cottages, so it was a perfectly pleasant walk. It was cloudy and cool on the walk there, but luckily I’d brought along my umbrella since it rained steadily on the walk home.

Now I’m armed with dayquil, nyquil, aleve, chapstick, and cough drops for when the next cold comes. I’m 27 years old and not really homesick at all, but there’s still something childishly thrilling about getting a package from home with your mom’s handwriting on the front.