I don't remember looking forward to the mail delivery as much as I have the last week.
Every day promises to be as exciting as Christmas morning or an Easter egg hunt.
It began when a nice widow lady in Arizona read about my wife's disgust with my old winter overcoat, a frayed, soiled, grungy garment I have worn for many years.
In the nice lady's closet was a splendid blue-black wool overcoat -- virtually new -- that had belonged to her late husband.
She said she wanted me to have the coat because her husband had been a fine man and she thought that I was too.
It fit perfectly, and my wife and co-workers said I had never worn a coat that made me look so successful and dignified.
They did express some mild reservations about whether wearing the coat was appropriate. As one of them put it: "Don't you think that wearing a coat that belonged to a dead stranger is kind of weird, even for you?"
Why not? It is a gift.
Besides, we are constantly told to recycle.
I was so grateful to the nice widow lady that I wrote a column about receiving the coat. And at the end, I wondered what happened to her husband's ties.
Unfortunately, that lady did not have any ties. But in a few days, a package arrived from Wisconsin with a note that said:
"My husband has been gone for two years. He's not dead, which wouldn't break my heart. I threw him out because he was a bum and I caught him playing around with a friend of mine.
"He left town in such a big hurry -- my brother was going to break his neck -- that he didn't take all of his clothes. I put them in a box in the basement, and I have been meaning to give them to the Salvation Army and take a tax write-off, but I never got around to it.
"My husband was short and fat and kind of ugly, and you don't look short and fat, so I don't think his clothes would fit. But you vTC mentioned ties, so I am sending you a few of them.
"I think you are just the person to have them because they are awful. He always had terrible taste, and I have the feeling that you do too.
"From what I have read, you sound like just as big a bum as he was, so it is only right that the ties should go around your neck. Knot them real tight and your wife might be as happy as I am."
While her sentiment could have been a bit warmer, the ties were excellent by my standards. Which means that they did not have any stains from gravy, pasta sauce or drool. And they all had labels. It's my experience that a tie that doesn't have a label is usually not high class. However, they can be worn backward once the front becomes gloppy.
The next day, this letter arrived from a lady in Columbus, Ohio:
"Your article on the overcoat got me thinking.
"I too am a widow living alone. So don't publish my name or address.
"My husband died last October and left me well-situated financially. He was frugal but not stingy.
"Among his personal effects are about 50 jockey briefs, of which 20 are still in original plastic packages. My husband never passed up a jockey briefs sale.
"Under separate cover, I'm sending the lot to you by UPS.
"I should tell you that the waist elastic in some of the used ones has stretched. But you can gather the waist in with a safety pin like he did.
"They are all perfectly laundered. My husband had a saying about such things: 'Rich not gaudy like a cat pawing cabbage.' "
My sentiments exactly. Show me a cat pawing cabbage and I'll show you cabbage being pawed by a cat.
So now I have an overcoat, several ties and almost a two-month supply of underwear. Is this a great country or what?
And I'll wear it all, although my wife said: "A dead man's underwear? You can't, you won't, I don't believe this." But as I always say to her: "Has anyone ever told you that you're beautiful when you cry hysterically?"
Who knows what will arrive in the next mail? (Coat size, 43; trouser waist, 37; inseam 32; shoes, 12 wide.)
Gosh, I've always wondered what it would be like to have a Mercedes.