Muslims at the Post Office

The internet is a wonderful thing. I rant about anything and post my opinions on this blog. Even if only a few people know about me, I feel consoled knowing anyone can read at his/her leisure about what I’m doing and thinking.

I also use e.mail to send brief notes, but, when I want to send a special message to a friend, I print a letter on paper and send it out by snail mail. That requires a stamp on the envelope.

I ran out of stamps. So I had to go to the post office. Our post office has a long barrier for patrons to stand behind as they wait to be called to the counter. As always, the line stretched along this barrier all the way back to the door. Only one clerk was on duty. As usual many people in line carried packages, which took a long time to process.

The line inched forward slowly. I let my heavy purse slide along the top of the barrier, glancing now and then at items on the shelf below. The man in front of me carried a big box; he looked Hispanic. I imagined he was a Mexican mailing something home to Mexico. That frequently happens at our post office. But for all I know he could have been a Native American sending a birthday gift to his daughter at Yale.

I got to talking to the woman standing behind me. As we neared the head of the line, we looked at the display of commemorative stamps behind the glass of the barrier: Gary Cooper, Bob Hope, and the Simpsons. I commented that I thought it sad that the new stamps were all entertainers. “Do these stamps really represent our country? Is this what our culture has degenerated into?”

The woman spotted a sheet of small dark stamps, partially hidden behind Bart Simpson. She said in disgust, “Those are Muslim stamps.”

The man in front of me was called to the counter.

The woman behind me said something about Muslims terrorists who should not be honored on United States postage stamps.

I said I knew some fine Muslim people.

She said, “I am a Christian. I won’t put Muslim stamps on my letters.”

It was my turn to buy stamps. I asked the clerk, “What do you have in commemoratives?”

“We only have the Hanukkah stamps,” she said and set out a sheet of the little brown stamps which the woman had denounced as “Muslim.” Each stamp pictured the eight-branched candelabra, a menorah. Observant Jews light one candle each night during celebration of the eight-night feast of Hanukkah, which comes near Christmas.

The woman I talked to at the post office could not distinguish between Muslim symbolism and a Jewish menorah. But what do your expect from a proud Texas Christian?