Norwood Avenue

My son and I returned from a visit to the NJ shore to see my parents Sunday afternoon.  The drive home had been longer than I had hoped.  (Sunday afternoon drives home are NEVER good, but I left in the early afternoon and was hoping for a break...I didn't get one.)  I was tired and a bit frustrated, but as I got out of the car I noticed something on the sidewalk by my parents’ house.  It looked like a large envelope and I was thinking maybe someone's trash had gotten away from them.

Let me be a bit clear when I say sidewalk.  In front of all the houses on our block is a walkway which empties out into the public sidewalk.  There is then a patch/strip of grass and then the street.  My parents' walkway actually goes all the way out to the street, so that there is a cement square where a garbage receptacle can be placed.  (We don't have this and I wish we did; especially when it snows and there is nowhere to put the trash!)  It was there that I saw the item, which is why I assumed it was trash.  (You know what they say about assuming though...)

As my son and I dragged our luggage inside, my husband went up to investigate.  Turned out it was a package.  An Amazon package to be specific.  A padded shipper that was from Amazon, but was to be delivered on Sunday (as per the label) by USPS.  It wasn't in my parents' mailbox.  It wasn't on their front steps/stoop.  It wasn't even really on their walkway (where you might find the daily newspaper.)  No, it was practically IN the street.  AND it WASN'T addressed to them.  It wasn't even addressed to anyone on the block.  It wasn't even addressed to anyone in my TOWN.

So, it's Sunday afternoon...and there's this package.  I have no idea how it got where it did, though my suspicion is that someone was delivering a package to someone else on the block and somehow this one fell off the truck?  What to do?  I'm guessing that what was inside was a book.  I like to read.  I could have opened it and gotten a freebie.  But that's bad karma to say the least!  I could have left it out in MY mailbox with a note and the hopes that it was actually reach the right destination, but...

Instead, hubby googled the address and found that it wasn't too far away.  Is it worth 30 minutes round trip to be a good neighbor? Even on a hot day, I think it is.  So off we went.

We found the house with no trouble.  I wanted my husband to ring the bell and explain (especially since I could see a Bucknell banner hanging in one of the windows), but instead he took a post it note and wrote a quick explanation, suggesting that they might want to contact their local post office.  (As if that would do anything...(remember this?  https://bfthsboringblog.blogspot.com/2018/12/where-do-i-live-us-postal-service-story.html).  After leaving the package on their front porch, hubby said he didn't think anyone was home, as the Sunday paper was still out.

And with that we turned around and went home.  It was maybe 1/2 an hour out of my day (which is nothing compared to my drive home from the shore) and it is my hope that whoever lives at 125 Norwood enjoys their book (or whatever was in the package) and that the note hubby wrote (which was actually quite amusing) brought a smile to their face.

I don't write all this down to toot my own horn.  (I should actually be tooting hubby's horn any way!)  I am writing to say that doing the right thing can be simple.  That we are all capable of delivering a package that was misdelivered.  We can chose to do something nice.


In a world that is seemingly full of hate, I chose to do something nice when the opportunity presents itself.  Not something complicated; just a simple human kindness.  Because we all need kindness.

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