Brian 
A quick drive down our street and you’ll notice a couple of things. First, that the trees in the front of the three houses at the end of the cul-de-sac are a different variety than the rest of the neighborhood, and second, that those same houses have very different mailboxes.
Ours and our neighbors’ on either side have more ornate stands. Two white, square posts carved to resemble something like Greek columns meet to form the base on which the box sits. They look like we’re all expecting to receive our admission letters from Plato’s Academy. The rest of the neighborhood — all 90+ homes — have mailboxes that look like someone got a discount at Lowes.
The reason, like the trees being different, is that our three were the first houses built. When we moved in we had the neighborhood to ourselves. A man and his son apparently had the contract to make these reputable-looking posts for the whole development.
Three houses in to the project and life runs it’s course. The father dies. The son, understandably, decides making mailbox posts is rather low on the the priority list in light of circumstances. Death’s effects trickle down…right to our mailboxes. I think of that often when I look out my window or drive around. A stranger dies, and things change in a small way.
I still don’t know who’s responsible for the trees.
