by Ron Collins
I went out to get the mail in yesterday. For those of you who are really serious about writing, I don’t need to explain the fixation I have for the mailbox. For the rest of you, let me say that the mailbox is Mecca, the sacred totem that must be faced once daily, the bringer of all news foul, yet a comfort beyond all my ability to describe.
So you can see why I was flustered when I discovered that our recent ice storm had temporarily welded the danged thing shut with a sheet of ice as thick as a standard pencil.
I stared at it for a moment, then tried the key anyway.
Why do we do things we already know aren’t going to work? The key butted ineffectually up against the ice.
In the meantime, the temperature is fifteen degrees, and I’m standing there in my leather jacket, a pair of galoshes over my slippers, and no hat fer cryin’ out loud. My cheeks are beginning to sting, and I’m sticking an inch-long key up against a glacial sheet of ice, pretending that it’ll somehow pierce its way into the heart of the mailbox and help me fish out the stack of rejections that must surely be behind that wall.
So I did what any self-respecting male of the species would do. I made a fist and hit the mailbox.
A small piece of the ice shattered, but did not fall away.
So I hit it again.
It gave me satisfaction, I’ll admit, but it became obvious that it would be nearly as quick to let the ice melt as it would be for me to pound the stuff away with my fist.
By now my ears hurt and I’m having flashbacks to when my dad read me Jack London’s “To Build a Fire”, a short story - probably a Novella - about a man in the Yukon who freezes to death. (Let’s not spend, much time thinking about why an adult would read a story to an eight-year-old about a man freezing to death in the Yukon, okay?).
Despite the cold, though, I felt another tickle up my spine. The mailbox stood there mocking me - you know - “Wassa matter, Ron?” it whispered. “You gonna let a little ice keep you from seeing what’s behind the box that Carol Wayne is standing beside?” (Let’s also not spend any time wondering why the mailbox is talking like a truly psychedelic combination of Richard Prior and Monty Hall, okay? We’ll just blame it on the ice crystals that were forming in my brain and leave it at that.)
At this point, it’s gotten personal. I would sooner be carried into the hospital stiff as a board than return to the house empty handed.
So I trudged stiff-legged back to the garage, grabbed the hammer and a heavy screwdriver, lashed the dogs to the sled, and set off on my own version of the Iditarod. A minute later, I stood before the mailbox, chipping at ice like an arctic Michelangelo.
Cars crunched by, their drivers grinning at me and shaking their heads like I was insane. I ignored them, though. After all, if they couldn’t see the damned gremlins sitting on the hood of their cars, who was I to flag them down, eh?
Ice flew through the air like ocean froth against the bow of Ahab’s ship. Tears in my eyes froze against my corneas, blurring my vision. If I had a beard, frost would have formed in it from my exhalations. But I was not to be swayed. I was winning, you see. The mailbox was yielding.
Finally, I could slide the key into the slot. A moment later, the rest of the ice was gone.
I was victorious. All of Rome was mine.
The fact that I could no longer feel my ears did nothing to dampen my soaring spirit.
So I turned the key, and opened the box.
Inside was a single letter, envelope neatly sealed and addressed to me.
. . .
If anyone wants a special rate Visa Card, let me know.
Copyright (c) 1999-2008 Ron Collins
All rights reserved.
No parts of this essay may be reprinted
without the expressed written consent of the author.
Author Bio:
Ron Collins lives in Columbus, Indiana with his wife and their daughter. He is an engineer by daylight and a writer of Science Fiction and Fantasy at night. He has published several short stories, including work in Dragon Magazine, the original anthology Return of the Dinosaurs, Marion Zimmer Bradley’s FANTASY Magazine (for which he was awarded a Cauldron Award for being a readers’ favorite author), and Adventures of Sword and Sorcery. Ron Collins’ writing has also appeared in Asimov’s, Analog, Dragon, and several other magazines and anthologies. His writing has received a Writers of the Future prize, and a CompuServe HOMer Award. You can find out much more about him at his award-winning web site, –> TYPOSPHERE <–.
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Pammy, the main character in the 
Many of those 
Editor of The Blue Rose Bouquet since 1998 and a professional writer since 1984,