In a previous post I mentioned how hand written letters seemed to be going the way of the dodo. When was the last time you used snail mail to correspond with a friend? Despite what my 14-year-old niece thinks I don’t think I’m that old, but it makes me feel ancient to think some college kids now have never sent anyone a letter through the US postal service. Consider my mind blown. Over the course of my life I’ve sent lots of letters to people, but admittedly most of them were before the dawn of the Internet age. Alabama Governor’s School was a really great experience for me because it facilitated my meeting some of my present day best friends and it also lead to me writing the first two people on my list:
- Jenny – We were in the same major class at AGS and developed a good friendship because of it. After the program was over we actually went back and reedited the video our class sent to all of the participants of the program. Since email wasn’t really being used at the time we sent a few letters back and forth to see how the summer was treating the other. A 45 minute drive and a local phone call was all that separated us, yet we chose to write. Through the years we kept in touch and developed one of my closest friendships.
- Bailie – She went to high school with a lot of my elementary school friends so we met when I struck up a conversation about them on the first week. Little did I know that conversation would be the catalyst of friendship that’s lasted years. AGS wasn’t the only summer program she did that summer so we wrote several letters back and forth while she was there.
- Kelly – High school was an interesting time for me and, in all honesty, was pretty boring in comparison to my college years on. Forging long term friendships wasn’t something I set out to do but some did form despite my reluctance. Kelly and I became fast friends and I wrote her letters because I tend to be more entertaining if I can proof what I am saying. The letter writing campaign lasted about one year.
- Jenny – She lived in Canada for a while and at the time we talked to each other on a daily basis. During her tenure there she didn’t have a set phone number so the only way to reliably contact each other was through letters. Those letters kept me going at a time when I seemed to be emotionally and physically exhausted. I’ll forever be grateful to her for that.
- Jamie – How we became such good friends is still a topic both of us wonder, but I am very thankful that we have. She and I share a love for music so we share new stuff with each other since we know the other’s taste. When I send her monthly CD, every now and then I’ll make a personalized note about what’s going on in my life or asking how hers is. It’s a bit redundant at times since we communicate almost daily via electronic means.
List 5 people you’ve handwritten letters.
Tags: Alabama Governor's School, Letters, Mail
July 14, 2008 at 9:38 am
1.) I wrote my first letter to one of my ex girlfriends, Tammy. I was hooked on her for years, but I remember declaring my undying love for her at age 16. LOL I wrote her this long two page letter during the summer before my junior year. I was excited about this letter. We remained close friends up until recently.
2.) I wrote a letter to my ex wife as well. I actually wrote several letters to her over the course of our relationship, even while we were still living in the house together. MOst of them fell on deaf ears, since she had the emotional depth of a catfish.
3.) I wrote my parents in the spring of last year and told them that me and the ex were officially breaking it off. They knew that we had been close to ending the whole thing the previous fall, but I tried to make it work. I explained to them how much effort I had put in, in comparison to her never giving a rip whether it worked out or not. Once they got my letter, they knew I was serious.
Funny how this list is mostly girls…
4.) I wrote a letter to my friend Tocora. At the time, I was really feeling her and we had been spending a lot of time talking and hanging out. I was like 20 and she was 17, but we liked each other. In the end, we decided to just remain as friends, even though her mom wanted us together. LOL
That’s all I have for now…
July 14, 2008 at 11:42 pm
Minus passing notes in High School the only one I can come up with are letters I would write to my current wife while we were at different colleges. We kept this up pretty well for our Freshman and Sophomore years and then it kind of faded away.
July 15, 2008 at 12:19 am
1. My parents – I often send them handwritten notes and cards to thank them for being such important, supportive and wonderful people in my life. Because often my life is too hectic to remember to articulate it to them in person, and because I am more eloquent in writing.
2. Jamie – we met in college and she’s the only friend from Elon that I’ve kept (and will keep forever). Since I live in MD and she lived in AL, then KY, I make sure to send her any card that when I see it, I hear her laugh. Because then I know it’s *really* funny!
3. Sarah – we became friends in high school homeroom freshman year, lost touch in college and in an odd turn of events, I ended up being someone else’s “plus one” to her wedding where we reunited. Close ever since, I try to send her handwritten, sometimes handmade, cards that tell her how wonderful she is. I also send cards to her husband, her daughter and her dog (my goddog).
4. Courtney – I bought my townhouse three years ago and Courtney bought hers soon after (in the same neighborhood). We discovered we had a common hobby (knitting) as well as a love for walking dogs and going to the dog park. Since I didn’t have a dog, she’d invite me to join her, and a friendship blossomed. Turns out that snail mail delights Courtney as much as it makes me happy, so she’s now one of the top people that I send cards, letters and packages to!
5. Harry – my mom’s first husband, and still a good friend of the family. He lives clear across the country from us in CA, but anytime I go on travel I make sure that I send a postcard to Harry. My list of people I send travel postcards to is actually quite long, but if I don’t have enough stamps/time to send them to everyone, I always make sure Harry makes the cut! (Along with Mom, Dad, my sister and my grandmother!)
I could keep going, but this is “List 5″ so…
July 15, 2008 at 5:12 pm
Wow. I used to write letters all of the time! I had so many pen pals that I actually had a little folio to keep up with it all. I even collected stationery and would trade back and forth with people. There was a time when I was maybe in 5th grade where I would be so excited to get home from school to check the mail. We traveled a good amount and I would trade addresses with all kinds of people that I met. I guess now people trade email addresses. But I would keep up with people for a little while and then there’d be other people to write who would actually write back… Eventually there just wasn’t time to write for pleasure anymore. Sad state of affairs really.
1. My grandmother — I would frequently write to my grandmother and she would write the best letters back. Always about the birds in her yard and the movies she’d been watching. I will still write to her from time to time but her hand has gotten a little too shaky for her to write back. We’ve been writing for a long time and she just lives in Montgomery.
2. Friends in Spain — There were 2 summers when my sister and I spent a month in a suburb of Madrid. This might be what started my pen pal world but I’m not 100% sure of that. We stayed with a family who had a daughter about our age and so we met all of her friends. It was lots of fun and I kept up pretty good correspondence with many of them for quite some time. They were the ones with the amazing paper collections. Kind of crazy but we would go to these stores and buy so much ridiculous paper. Before we left I remember getting all of the people I met to write me a note (some with their addresses) so that I would always remember them. I still have all of them and many of them are in Spanish and some in the Spanglish fusion. We’ve almost lost touch with the family we stayed with but still call once a year around the holidays.
3. Amelia — There was this one girl whom I met at a hotel swimming pool in South Bend, Indiana one summer when we were at one of my dad’s college reunions. For some reason we became fast friends. I think it was the discussion about pop. I had no idea what pop was. It’s all coke to me. Anyway, she lived somewhere in the Midwest. I think in Indiana. I vaguely recall that she and her family would just go to the hotel to swim; they weren’t actually staying there. I always wanted to go visit her but I was not even a teenager at that point and really our correspondence didn’t last that long.. But it was fun getting to know somebody through letters.
4. Jade — She was actually a pen pal that I got connected with through a pen pal service! She lived in Australia and we would send each other all kinds of things like maps and photos and random trinkets. I can’t remember the name of this program but I think it was free and in some magazine. I don’t know. My sister did it first and in true younger sister fashion I followed suit. We were both good corresponders but she actually met and traveled with her Australian pal. Jade and I corresponded for a while but then lost touch.
5. My sister — We used to do all kinds of summer activities, some together but many separately because of the 2 year age difference. We’d always write each other letters. Summer camps mainly I recall but I’m sure there were other times like when we were both in college and she studied abroad in Amsterdam. That couldn’t have been before email but somehow writing and receiving letters was still so much better for us then. This actually kind of makes me want to sit and write her a letter since she’s so far away in Oakland.
Fun stuff, writing letters!
July 15, 2008 at 10:17 pm
first, let me state that i am a lazy, forgetful person on most fronts. procrastination is my sport of choice, which is why the majority of these letters that i am about to list were never mailed.
1. nick- after moving to savannah for college, i found a pack of postcards in a local art supply store. these post cards have retro pics of women doing average things, but have hilarious text blocks printed on them. example: a picture of a happy bride with the caption “she was blissfully unaware of her peril”. after i got nick’s address, told him i was going to send him a post card, and stamped it, the postcard remained in a pile of miscellany on my desk, until it was unearthed 5 months later, forgotten again and finally, lost.
2. elementary school. EES decided to give every classroom its own address ( i wish i could remember the names of the “streets” ) and create its very own postal system. i remember getting letters from my brother joey, and writing responses. . .i think i have one of these letters somewhere in my trunk of memories. this was the first and last year we attended the same school together, and i always felt very special receiving responses to the letters i sent him.
3. leonardo dicaprio. ok, so as embarrassing as it is, leo was my celebrity crush at around age 12. i wrote a letter oozing preteen lust and praising his acting genius. however, it never got mailed due to my aforementioned laziness. otherwise, i presume he would’ve shown up on his white stallion about 10 years ago. . .
4. various school related letters. . .from the assigned letters one writes to show that we’ve learned the difference in business letters and personal letters to actual letters we wrote to penpals. i’ve had to write letters to a company either complaining about their product or complimenting their success, and write letters to friends or family to prove that i know how to correctly address an envelope.
5. letters that were purposefully not mailed. over the years, there have been many losses and heartaches in my life. i’ve been angry and disheartened, but couldn’t find an appropriate outlet for that emotion. writing letters that i know will never be received is an easy way for me to rethink and analyze my feelings, while still letting enough out to keep me from going insane. it’s comforting to express your thoughts without fear of repercussion.