Oops, I did it again.
Amazon Prime is one of my favorite things in the world. With one click, I can order nearly anything and it arrives on my doorstep two days later. If I’m short on but not yet completely out of shampoo or toilet paper, I don’t have to make a special trip to the store. For me this is a wonderful thing, as in general I dislike running errands.
Most of the time, however, the two day shipping is just a happy convenience and not a necessity.
Which brings me to this morning. I was lounging in bed reading on a lazy Sunday morning when I heard a thump followed by my ringing doorbell. I winced. I rolled over, propped up the window, waved and yelled thank you to the postal worker. He smiled and waved back.
And thus it was that I received three jugs of cat litter and cucumber body wash on Sunday.
These Sunday Amazon deliveries make me feel guilty.
Even though it’s in name only these days, Sunday should be a day of rest. Of sleeping in at the very least. Of church if that’s your thing, or football, or making soup on a rainy day. It’s a day of pajamas and living easy and reading the newspaper. And if that’s not always—or even usually—how it actually goes, it should at least be our aspiration.
Nothing makes me feel like a diva more than the poor postman having to drag himself to work on Sunday so I can get my running shoes and printer ink.
I wish Amazon had a little box you could check that said, “Yes, I’m ordering this on Friday because my boss left the office early so I have time to screw around on the internet. I don’t actually need this on Sunday. Please just feel free to drop it off Monday with the rest of the mail.”
But perhaps I shouldn’t worry about it. I still get a physical Sunday newspaper every week, and I don’t feel a bit guilty about that. In fact I got angry when the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette began offering an online only version for its Christmas Day edition. And I’d bet that my newspaper carrier wakes up even earlier than the guy who dropped off my cat litter.
Both delivering the paper on Sunday and no mail on Sunday are just the way things are done. We get used to things the way they are and don’t always want them to change, even for our benefit.
Heck, for all I know, the man who delivered my cat litter this morning loves working Sundays because he gets out of an awkward extended family dinner and makes overtime in the process.