This is why you’re not getting postcards. (Bit of a lengthy post, sorry)

It occurs to me that there’s been a bit too much sweetness and light in here lately, so I thought I’d remedy that before it all gets rather Stepford Wives-y.

I should mention that this episode was entirely in Italian, which on one hand I’m quite proud of, but on the other hand is very dispiriting, because clearly I was missing some vital element of what was going on, and I don’t know what that was.

I went to the post office for an envelope and stamps, and started at the window of the grumpy old man I bought stamps from the other day (stamps are francobolli, which I think is a delicious word). He wasn’t grumpy just with me, I saw him being snippy with some perfectly sweet American girls.

I asked him if I could pay him for my envelope, and he said no, and pointed at the opposite counter.

“and the stamps?”

“Afterwards,” nodding and waving at the same counter.

Grazie.

I got one of those little numbered tickets for a place in line; the tickets are subdivided by the kind of service you want – deposits and withdrawals, forms, post and packages. The descriptions are in English as well as Italian, which was helpful. I THOUGHT.

So, I waited my turn, and it was busy, so it took a while, and then brought my stuff to the lady at the counter, and asked for stamps.

“Stamps?” (You’d have thought I had asked for a kilo of prime rib, by her expression). “For stamps, you go there,” pointing to the grumpy man.

“But-he told me here…”

She turns to him and has brief discussion in fast Italian. He looks at me with loathing.

“There.” She points again.

“And this?” pointing to my envelope.

“Over there,” waving to the opposite counter.

OK.

I went back to Grumpy, and he totally ignored me while he leafed through his book of stamps.

I waited.

And waited.

“Excuse me?”

“Wait a minute,” he snarled (honestly – snarled).

“I’ve BEEN waiting twenty minutes.”

Ignores me for a few more minutes, then finally gets me my stamps. I once again tried to pay for my envelope, and he again waved me to the opposite counter.
Grazie MILLE.

So, I went over there, and tried to pay for my envelope, and she waved me to the opposite counter. Seriously.

“But, but….” Italian was definitely letting me down at this point, and she didn’t speak English. “They told me…”

“Over there.”

I got out my 50 eurocents, plonked it down on her counter, and walked off, with her calling after me.

Then I went to address my envelope. I finished, and the man next to me asked if he could borrow my pen. I handed it over while I licked stamps and sealed, then realised that he was filling out the longest form in the world.

Now, I completely realise that this is when I really should have just LET it GO. The pen, after all, is not a vintage Cross, Waterman, or Mont Blanc. In fact, now that I look at it, I see that it has “Trailer Sales, Shelley Idaho,” written on it. There are other pens in Florence. I’m pretty sure I could have walked out the door and found one quite easily, perhaps with a picture of the Duomo on it. But I knew I’d need my pen again in a minute, and didn’t WANT to buy another simply because this man lacked the foresight to bring one to the post office, even though he had presumably come here expressly to fill out his epic form.

“Sir? Sir, I have to go – my pen?”

He says something about “can’t you wait?” He carries on writing.

“Sir?”

HE TOTALLY IGNORES ME.

“Sir! My PEN.”

He hands it over with very bad grace.

It was as I was stalking out the door that I realised I wasn’t entirely sure that I’d paid the correct amount for my envelope. This means that, somehow, tomorrow I have to go back to the post office where everyone now hates me, hoping that they don’t recognise me (sometimes it is inconvenient to be 5’10”, red-haired, and foreign), and if necessary, find some way of sneaking the extra 10-20 cents onto someone’s counter, because there’s really no way that I’m going to be able to explain it in Italian.

I think I’ll just throw it and run.