By: Keith Kappes
Columnist
Carter County Times
I apologize to my readers for wasting your time and this newspaper’s space a few months ago when I twice ranted about so-called charities that use junk mail to flood our mailboxes, e-mail, and telephones with solicitations for gifts.
I whined to you about getting as many as eight direct mail pieces a day and that I had accumulated nearly 70 addresses of these organizations. Those figures have grown to a dozen mail pieces on some days and more than 100 addresses of mailers who obviously swiped or purchased my home mailing address from a charity I had supported in the past.
It saddens me to report that my disclosure about marking unwanted mail with “Refused, Return to Sender” and returning it to the post office was totally incorrect. I boxed up nearly 50 such pieces of direct mail and delivered them to my local postmaster, smugly thinking all along the junk mail companies would be charged return postage.
That plan evolved after I’d called and written to ask several of them to remove me from their mailing lists, but those pleas were ignored, and the junk mail kept rolling in.
To my dismay, a friendly mail clerk sympathized with me but quickly informed me that almost none of the mail would be sent back and that the rest would go to the local landfill as trash.
One of my neighbors told me that he has seen a letter carrier discard such mail at a gas station. I thought about sending a sharply worded letter of protest to the postmaster general but recalled that the Trump appointee in that job likely wouldn’t read such a complaint.
A few days ago, I received a record 14 pieces of junk mail at one time. Sadly, I had to settle for the simple joy of ripping them open and tossing into my office trash can. Those with postpaid return envelopes received scrap paper but I had the satisfaction of knowing they had to pay to get them back.
Sometimes, we must settle for small victories.
Contact Keith at keithkappes@gmail.com.
