The Missing Stamp

It's troublesome to finish addressing, stuffing, and sealing 124 envelopes to find that you've used 124 58-cent stamps (for the outer envelopes) but only 123 41-cent stamps (for the inner envelopes). It means that someone on the guest list will receive an unstamped return envelope, and may wonder if I'm poor, ignorant, or sloppy—or maybe all three.

I should pretend that the missing stamp was planned and the recipient of the unstamped envelope will receive a special wedding door prize. I should put my pinky up, toss back my head, look down my nose, and ask, in my snootiest Southern-belle accent, "Don't you know that door prizes are being given at awlll the must-attend weddings this season? Where haave you been?"

If I were just a tad more stylish, I might be able to pull it off. But there's not a stylish (or snooty) bone in my body. Friends of the bride—that "most likely to wear pearls and heels in the OR," "Ann Taylor is the mother ship" fashionista—may be surprised to learn that the mother of the bride dresses like a cross between aging
"peace, love, and anti-materialism" hippie and axe-toting mountain-woman. Think Renée Zellweger in Cold Mountain, with tie-dye.

So I'll admit it. The answers to the wonderings in the first paragraph are yes, yes, and yes—and, sometimes, yes again. I'm poorer than I'd like to be, aware of my ignorance, and, when it comes to carefully pasting on 124 stamps, sloppy enough to miss one. There's no door prize for receiving the unstamped envelope, but if I find out who I cheated, I will buy you a beer.