{ In Which I Reveal My Antiquity }

My husband turned 25 last month. It was a rather momentous occasion for both of us. Twenty-five is a milestone birthday: Quarter of a century, halfway to 50, etc. It's how old I turned just three weeks after we started dating {yes, yes, I'm a cougar}. So now that the fresh-faced 22-year-old man I married is now 25, that means I'm really old. Like, 3.5 years older than he is. {I'm tired. I'll let you do the math.}

As in, so old that I lose birthday presents.

Or wait--did I??

I don't know if it's just me or maybe it's the men in my family, but I have the hardest time buying gifts for my dad, brothers, and now my husband. Usually I haven't the foggiest what they'd like. After much prodding, Mike gave me a list of gadgets he'd like for his birthday and I {of course} waited till it was almost too late to order them online. The package would probably arrive before his birthday, but might possibly get here late.

As long as we've been married, Mike has gotten the mail every night on his way home from work. It's what his dad did and it works for us. As his birthday neared, I started stopping at the mailbox on the way home in case his gift had arrived. Sometimes I'd remember to tell him. Sometimes he'd walk in the front door and, slightly exasperated, exclaim, "Did you get the mail today? Because I stopped and there was nothing!"

His birthday came and went. No package. Crestfallen, I still stopped at the mailbox most days...even if it was late, I wanted it to be a surprise. A surprise that he hadn't shaken for twenty minutes before bringing it in to the house.

Finally, about a week after Mike's birthday, I decided to see if my emailed receipt had a tracking number. Sure enough, it did. I looked up the package.....and according to the USPS, it had been delivered on September 20. Three days before Mike's birthday.

I. Flipped.

We live in a condo. Every unit in our complex has a locked mailbox at a central location. Adjacent to the regular mailboxes is a bank of larger locked boxes for packages. This is the only place the USPS delivers mail to our complex. I was now faced with these possibilities: (a) someone had stolen the package {or the key for a larger box} from our mailbox; (b) the package had been put in a larger box, but the key had been accidentally put in someone else's mailbox and they had decided to keep the package; or (c) the mailman had gone nuts, driven to our unit, placed the package on our stoop, and someone had stolen it.

Two of my childhood friends' fathers work for the USPS. I was not buying (c). But I was totally revved up to chew out some poor, unsuspecting postal worker. They had screwed up my husbands 25th birthday present!!!

I called the post office from which the package had been delivered, but of course the recorded message said they only answered the phone till 3:00pm. It was 3:02.

The next day, work was really busy and I didn't have a chance to call. But I sure wanted to!

The following day was again very busy and I wasn't able to call before 3:00. It was Friday, and as usual after work I went to the grocery store. Back at my car, I unlocked the trunk to put the groceries in and....

......drugstore mailers. Missing-children fliers. A bill. Junk mail. A bubble wrap package. Strewn across the trunk of my car like....like they'd been riding around back there for ten days.

Unbelieving, I picked up the package and ripped it open. Sure enough, the phone accessories I'd purchased for Mike! I don't know how long I stood in the parking lot, holding the package, a cart of groceries next to me. I have no memory of picking up the mail and there being a package. I have no memory of putting a day's worth of mail in the trunk. Why would I put it in the trunk?!! That makes no sense! I have no need to do that. I don't put anything in the trunk except groceries. Why do I not have even the tiniest remembrance of this occurrence?

When Mike got home from work that night, I sheepishly told him of my discovery. He grinned glee at my absentmindedness and embarrassment--I'd been quite vocal regarding the mysterious disappearance of this package. That the package had actually arrived three days before his birthday, I'd gotten it from the mailbox, put it in my trunk {again, why???}, and not only forgotten about it but thought it had never been delivered for the following ten days, is quite amusing. In a really disturbing, I'm-still-in-my-twenties-and-this-does-not-bode-well-for-my-mental-capacities-in-the-future sort of way.

If you see me wandering around the internet looking lost...please take my hand and show me the way back home!