How can I mail a letter?

There are going to be times when you need to understand the U.S. mail. Sure, there are lots of other choices for sending messages, but the mail is still the only way to get a unique piece of paper in front of a person.

My grandfather was a mailman and his brother and his father were mailmen too, and that was so long ago that it was acceptable to call any man who worked with mail a “mailman.” Your great-great grandfather, the senior mailman, was born a year before the first telephone line was strung. He grew up in a setting where mail was as much a lifeline to folks then as your cell phone is to you now.

Imagine what it was like to have no means of communicating with the outside world other than shouting out a window or writing a letter and waiting for a reply. You may think of it as…