Summer in the City

We are not so frantically but quite expensively trying to get things together for our unexpected trip to Estonia. Tickets are already a known high cost, and I don’t even get to fly first class! On top of that, we have to get Luka’s passport, and get it quick—which costs double as well as extra time in line for the entire family. All must be present to swear everything is true in the 5 month old baby's application--seriously, we put our right hands in the air and swore Luka is Luka and he is really 29 inches tall.

But the Post Office is a communal home for all people: rich and poor, old and young, clothed and unclothed (see picture if you dare). In front of us in line were Nigerian and Taiwanese and Mexican and Japanese yet all American, each holding their certificate of naturalization. Behind us in line were Gold Digger and Pimp Daddy. Pimp Daddy was getting Gold Digger a passport so he could take her to some far away land. Pimp Daddy, very annoyed, was giving a running commentary about the Nigerian, Taiwanese, Mexican and Japanese lame questions--and probably commenting under his breath about the 3 year old playing with spiderman and the infant babeling incessently.

Fortunately, or unfortunately, even though we were sixth in line to put our application to the postmaster’s test of approval—it went very quickly because those in front of us couldn’t quite read the instructions and each were missing a piece of identification or didn’t know where they were going or when or how they were going to get there—or their own place of employment. Luka is employed by us, so his job: baby. He is going to visit his Ded and Gala, so purpose of travel: concentrated Russian brainwashing (positive, of course). Never been married, check. Height, 29 inches (fortunately 42 inches and under can still apply). City of birth: Portland, Or. The only thing we didn’t know were the last 4 digits of our zip code 97209. No problem, we were at the post office—surely they would know. The post lady said “This is post office 97208. I know only our last 4 digits!” Bam, bam with her stamps—rip, tear and seal the envelope closed. “That will be one check for $62.15 and another for $95.12. Good luck and Good bye” she said—“Give this all to the man over there” (next to naked lady)

Thankfully this country doesn’t discriminate against race, profession, country of origin or even amount of clothes you wear so all of us left the Post Office successful in our ventures. Hopefully the lack of the 4 last zip code digits won’t leave us in Portland for the summer! They do discriminate against Romka—this was the post office he was banned for life from a couple years ago—a little incident about duct tape and flying boxes, but that is a story for another day.

click on image for the real thing