Transcript for #56 44 Photos

Hello. Hello. Do you know who this is?

Yeah, you got me.

It's funny you should say this because one time when I was like in middle school my friend called my house and I picked up the phone and I was like hello and she thought it was my dad. She was like, hi Rob is Stevie home and I just pretended that in fact I was my father and I like was just like, uh, yeah, let me get her.

I think I was just so embarrassed that I could possibly be mistaken for an old man.

I'm Stevie Lane, and this is Heavyweight. Today's episode, 44 photos. right after the break. There are places, according to Celtic folklore, where the boundary between our physical world and the spiritual world is porous, where Earth and the otherworldly are separated by no more than a few inches. At these places, strange unexplainable things can happen. These places are called thin places, and this is a story about one of them. a few years ago, Jordan Kissner wrote a book about thin places. She wanted to send it to her friend Amy.

Jordan bought a brown padded envelope, put her book inside and handed it to the postal worker.

Something Amy had been expecting. The package Jordan sent her.

Amy brought the package back to her house and eagerly tore it open. But inside, Amy did not find Jordan's book. She didn't find a book at all. Instead, she found a stack of photographs.

Amy didn't recognize anyone in the photos. There was one of a girl wearing a blue t-shirt with clouds printed on it. Another of three teenagers and caps and gowns. The people were of all different ages and races. Some of the photos were in black and white, some in color. One was a polaroid. Amy counted 44 photos in all. 44 photos of complete and total strangers. And yet, the package was labeled to Amy. Her name written in Ballpoint Pen. Jordan's return address was scrolled in the upper left-hand corner.

So Amy texted Jordan, telling her she received her package, but rather than a book, found 44 photographs inside.

Amy sent Jordan a picture of the package and all 44 photographs spread out on her kitchen counter and she said what in all caps.

It was hard to know what to make of the whole thing. It's like any expected a book about thin places, but gotten actual thin place experience instead. Amy can't bring herself to just throw the photos away. So for an entire year now, she's kept them by her desk. And for an entire year, she's been studying them. There's the one of a new baby sucking on someone's finger. There's a little girl in glasses and a cheerleaders outfit holding her leg up and smiling confidently into the camera. The more Amy looks at the photos, the more she thinks about the family that's missing them. These people in the photos are nobody's to Amy, but they are somebody's to somebody.

A year ago, when Amy first received the package, she and Jordan tried opening a case file on the mysterious photos. Hoping the USPS could shed light on where they came from, but nothing ever came of it.

There's a lot that I don't know about it. But Amy and Jordan want my help figuring out how Amy ended up with the photographs and how to return to Sender. To get to the bottom of it, I'll have to navigate a mysterious little understood world that exists alongside our own. A world separated only by an inches wide slot in a metal box. And so, I step over the boundary into the world of the United States Postal Service. I start with a theory that Jordan Amy and I discussed on the phone. Jordan had sent Amy the book via Media Mail, a discounted rate for sending things like books and CDs. From what I read online, it sounds like the post office searches media mail packages to prevent people from sending anything they want on the cheap. And in fact, Amy noticed that the package had been taped up, as though it had been resealed on route. Maybe Jordan's package and the package with the photos were both searched and then accidentally swapped. To test this theory, I call the postal inspection service. It turns out the post office has a whole department of inspectors. Are you sort of like the James Bond of the mail service?

His name is Michalco. Dan Michalco. He's a U.S. Postal Inspector, and what does he inspect?

I put my theory to Dan. Might the Postal inspection service have opened an examine Jordan's package?

Dan says USPS investigators don't inspect packages without probable cause.

Dan guesses that somewhere along the way, Jordan's package got damaged and the book fell out. Another package, carrying the bundle of photos, could have also broken open. A postal worker might have seen the loose bundle of photos, thought they belonged in Jordan's envelope, and accidentally switched the packaging. And here's where that switch might have occurred.

The male recovery center, or MRC, is located in Atlanta, Georgia. It's where all undeliverable male winds up. Some of the stuff they receive is truly strange. An alligator skull still covered in flesh, cremation boxes, Tom Nesalke's 1971 NBA Championship ring, which had been stolen from him 12 years before showing up at the MRC. I don't know who Tom Nesalke is, but listeners might The MRC is also one of the few places where postal workers are actually allowed to open mail to help them look for clues as to where the items are letters belong. Dan says that it's the job in part of the MRC employees to make their best guess about what belongs with what and send it on its way.

In their own way. Don't condescend to the MRC agent, Mihalko. If Dan is right, the original package the photos came in with the original address might still be sitting somewhere at the MRC. So I phone up the person in charge to ask.

Oh, hi Lionel. My name is Stevie Lane, and I'm a radio journalist. Do you have a moment? I swear I can tell you why I'm calling.

Nevertheless, I tell him about the mix-up.

Lionel tells me that contrary to Danny Halko's theory, Jordyn's package likely never made it to the MRC. If it had, it would probably have a special stamp on it, which Jordyn's package doesn't. I ask if he has any other guesses, but he just keeps whipping out his favorite phrase.

Jordan had likened the mail system to avoid into which we send stuff and from which that stuff emerges. But it appears it's also avoid into which I send my questions and from which nothing emerges. Over a number of weeks, I reach out to more people at the USPS in the communications department, the historian's office, even the postal museum. It is a mystery.

Nobody is able to help. I've hit a dead end with the post office, so I turned to the only other information that I have. The photos themselves. Is there a way to identify the people in these photographs? There's a photo of someone's pet cat, but it doesn't have a collar with a tag. There's a graduation, but it doesn't show the name of the school. There's one photo of a man sitting in a restaurant holding up a signed headshot of what looks like a younger version of himself. The headshot is signed, Dr. Pedro something, MD. But after hours of Photoshop sharpening, I still can't read what that something is. For every photo, I'm just one small piece of information away from cracking the case. Every photo, except for one. The photo is the oldest in the bunch, a creased and faded polaroid. In it, a man crouches in the grass, supporting a baby and plaid overalls, barely old enough to walk. The baby is looking down at a dog, rolling over on its back playfully while the man pets its stomach. No one is aware of the camera. It seems to be capturing a private moment. And when you flip the photo over, there's something written on the back. Dalin, Kelly, and Queenie, it says in all caps. At grandparents, Coxes, Kelly, nine and a half months.

Dallin, Kelly, and Queenie. Grandparents, Coxes. After Googling around, I find a number for a Dallin Cox in California.

Hi, is this Dallin?

I'd call the few days before and left a message.

So I explained about the package of photos they me received about one in particular of a man with a child and a dog with an inscription on the back. And it says, Dalin, Kelly and Queenie at grandparents, Coxes, Kelly nine and a half months.

Dallin's dad is Dallin's senior. Dallin suggests I give him a call to see if the photo belongs to him. Hello. I tell Dallin's senior all about the photo of him and his daughter Kelly. Then I texted over to him. All right, here it comes.

Kelly died on March 30th, 2021. The package with Kelly's photo was postmarked April 7th, 2021. Just one week after she died.

Kelly died unexpectedly of heart failure at the age of 53. It was a shock to her family.

Dawn's senior doesn't recognize the handwriting on the back of the photograph, but he wonders if it belongs to Kelly's mother, his ex-wife, Betty. Betty had been sick and unable to make it to Kelly's funeral. Maybe she put it in the mail hoping it would arrive for the service. When I phone Betty, she doesn't remember the photo, but she tells me that she did indeed mail a package of photos to her granddaughter, Devon. Devon is Kelly's daughter. This is Devon. So I called Devon to see if I ended up with the photos that her grandma tried to send her.

Devon got the photos from Betty in a package that was firmly sealed. And the photo of Kelly and Dalin, that one wasn't in there. Devon says she's never seen it before. As for the rest of the photographs, Amy received,

None of them, huh? No. Down in junior, down in senior and Betty, all said the same thing when I sent them the photos. Somehow then, it seems this photograph, along its journey through the mail, wound up with 43 other images of other random families. Devon can't tell me anything about those other families, but she does tell me about her own. Her mom, Kelly, got pregnant with her when she was in college. Kelly wasn't prepared to take care of a child. And soon after Devon was born, down in senior, Devon's grandfather took Devon in and raised her as his daughter.

But Devon tells me, in the last seven or eight years before her mom's death, that changed. Devon was in her mid-20s, and without explanation, seemingly overnight, Kelly started reaching out more. She would come over to help Devon with projects around the house, like painting cabinets. The two of them spent hours sitting together on the couch, playing Zelda.

As for the photograph and the strange circumstances of its appearance, I don't feel like it's a weird thing.

Did you something like that? How do you mean it fits her personality to do something like that?

See, you think that this is almost like a missive from your mom.

In Jordan's book, she writes that, in thin places, quote, invisible things like music or love or dead people might become visible. Or if they don't become visible, they become so present and tangible that it doesn't matter. Like Devon, I'm not one to believe in ghosts. Yet, after talking with everyone, I still don't know where the photo of Kelly came from. No one in Kelly's family can account for it. So after months of searching, the origins of this photo are still a mystery. But in what I see as a series of unexplainable events that began with Jordan sending a book and ended up here, Devon sees her mother. And it's precisely the unlikeliness of the events that she points to as proof.

I'd been thinking of this as a story about male going to the wrong place. But listening to Devon, I wonder if it's actually a story about it going to the right one to Amy. And yet, because the photo wound up in Amy's hands, Devon didn't get it for an entire year after Kelly's death. If Kelly wanted Devon to have the photo, why deliver it a year late? Why now?

Right after a loss, there are lots of people to lean on. But this time passes, and people return to their lives, you begin to feel that loss in a new way. Houses get cleaned out, clothes get donated, and all evidence of the person fades away. With the photo, though, Kelly has come back to Devon. A year late, but perhaps, right on time, Devon's grandfather, Dalin Sr., is turning 75 soon. Devon told me that they're throwing him a big party. She's been working on his birthday present for months, a new family photo album. And along with all the photographs she's collected, she wants to include this one. Safe among the other smiling faces of Kelly's family members. Where, surely, it won't be lost again.

This episode of Heavyweight was produced by me, Stevie Lane, along with Jonathan Goldstein, Phoebe Flanagan, and Mohini McGoutker. Our senior producer is Khalilaholt. Special thanks to Alex Bloomberg, Mimi O'Donnell, Lauren Silverman, Maureen Taylor, Estelle Ivory, and all the incredibly patient people over at the USPS. Editorial guidance from Emily Condon. Bobby Lord makes the episode with original music by Christine Fellows, John K. Samson, Blue Dot Sessions, Sean Jacobi, and Bobby Lord. Additional music credits can be found on our website, gimletmedia.com slash heavyweight. Our theme song is by the weaker than courtesy of Epitaph Records. Amy has just written a new book, Artificial, a graphic memoir about her father's efforts to preserve her late-grandfather's identity using AI technology. You can find it at your local bookstore. Heavyweight is a Spotify original podcast. Follow us on Twitter at Heavyweight on Instagram at Heavyweight Podcasts or email us at Heavyweight at gimletmedia.com. You can follow our show on Spotify and tap the bell to receive notifications when new episodes drop. And one will drop next week.