One of my favorite surprises is an unexpected card or letter from a pen pal. Although these surprises are much less frequent than the pre-social media era, I am not ready to give up on my pen pals and the art of letter writing.
Because, of course, one must send letters in order to receive them. And, even better, one must send interesting, thought provoking letters containing questions that the letter receiver is eager to answer.
Writing letters to friends, family, and people that you know in real life makes the whole process easier and opens up a whole host of interesting questions to ask. Folks you know well and have a history with will also be more interested to know the details of your life, updates on pets, gossip, and little dramas of the day to day.
For example, Emma and I are childhood friends, we actually met as babies! Neither of us remember that first meeting of course, but sometimes in the 90's we decided to become pen pals. We were about 6 or 7 years old, our writing skills were very basic and full of hilarious spelling mistakes. Now, she has moved to the east coast of the USA and I to South America. Neither has visited the other's new home and our letters are full of updates on our rural lives as well as dotted with nostalgic references to our childhood, teenage years, and early 20's during which we have consistently written each other.
On the other hand, I have a couple of pen pals that I have "met" only through social media. I must admit, these pen pal ships aren't quite the same. Not feeling sure of what details would interest someone I do not really know and not sure of what is appropriate to ask the letters tend to be short. It helps to pick someone who is interested in similar aspects of life but that is hard to know via their social media profile alone. These pen pal ships tend to fizzle out after about a year or so.
Above is a letter my partner sent me while I was away visiting my parents. He very sweetly included the "signatures" of our three cats who I missed so very much while away. I missed him as well! So, receiving and unexpected, physical token of his love and their essence in the mail was a wonderful surprise to keep us feeling close despite the miles between us.
Including found art, elements of collage or even your latest piece of work in letters is another way to keep a handwritten correspondence going. Part of my creative process includes creating handmade publications about herbalism and art. I like to keep my college roommates, childhood friends, and even online acquaintances in the loop by sending them my most recent publication plus a page-long letter just for them.
In so many ways I appreciate the ease of keeping in touch via social media and blogging but, somehow I think we will miss the authenticity and slowness of sitting down to write or read a letter. What do you think? Do you write letters from time to time?