In my post, Memory Bear–He Loved Her First, I wrote about making a memory bear for my husband from the plaid shirts that belonged to his daughter. Although she referred to herself as “Kimber” as did most of her friends down in her hometown of Cape Girardeau, her dad would often say “I didn’t name her Kimber, I named her Kim.” So that is what she was always known to us. But when it came to making her memory bears, I had to use her name “Kimberly Ann” because that is who is in my heart.

On this Monday with Morie, I was able to deliver one of the bears to Kim’s brother when we had lunch with him and his wife. He knows I’m not much of a hugger, so we just exchanged fist bumps.

I’ve made four bears so far; one for her dad, one for a brother, one for her sister, and one for her very best friend, whom I’ll call Sam. Kim and Sam had been best friends for a long time and Kim talked so much about Sam that I felt as if I knew her. I had met her once when I was in Cape with Kim but it was in listening to all the antics Sam and Kim went through and the time Kim spent together with herSam’s family, which made me feel as if I really knew her. Since the time of Kim’s death, Sam and I have remained in contact and I feel she is a friend.

Right before we left for vacation, I mailed a memory bear to Sam. It only cost me $7.50 and came with $50 insurance and a tracking number. I’ve never had a problem mailing a package with the postal service before, but luckily I kept this receipt. I fully expected I would hear from Sam after she received the bear so when I didn’t hear from her for a week after she was supposed to have received the bear, I sent her a message. When she responded, she said she had not received the bear. Like I said, luckily, I had kept the receipt so I was able to use the tracking number which unfortunately showed that the bear had been delivered as promised on July 27 and left “on or in” her mailbox. When I told her this, she said she’d look into it.

Sam told me she had checked with her kids and her neighbor and contacted her post office. She was told that her regular carrier had been off that day and a substitute had run her route. The man she spoke to told her he’d check with the substitute carrier and get back with her. A couple days later I contacted Sam again to see if she had heard back from her post office. She said she had tried to call several times but had not been able to get anyone to speak to her again or return her phone call. Sounded kind of fishy to me…like maybe the box disappeared in the mail truck and they didn’t want to admit it was lost or stolen.

The next day Sam messaged me that the mail carrier had stopped by her house while she was at work and talked to her daughter. The mail carrier said that she remembered the day, that the package was on her list, but it wasn’t on her truck. She said she’d called the postmaster and he told her to go ahead and scan it as delivered and he would take care of it. And it hasn’t been seen since. The mail carrier offered to pay to replace whatever it was, but her daughter explained to the mail carrier that what was in the package couldn’t be replaced.

Sam contacted the post office again and tried to speak to the Postmaster but he was gone for the day. Later that evening the postal worker she’d been talking to all week came to her house. He told her that after hearing what was in the package and how upset she was, he stayed late and tore the whole place apart until he found it!!!!

He said it was nothing short of a miracle, but he knew he had to try.

 

It was such a blessing that this man, who could have just brushed off this incident as “not my problem,” decided to go the extra mile and in doing so found the package.

And when I think about it, there are many blessings included in this one act of kindness:

The blessing that my other step-daughter brought me the shirts, to begin with–Thank you, Crystal;
The blessing that I learned to sew–Thank you, mom.
The blessing that the postal worker had enough compassion to go the extra mile and ultimately found the package–Thank you Postal Worker
And mostly, the blessing that we had Kim, Kimber, Kimberly Ann in our life. Thank you Ki for being you.

She was loved and I miss her so damn much, and I really needed this reminder that she’s with me right now.

And… I’ve been crying like a baby ever since.