snail mail

I got [another] letter from [my hero] Kate Chieco yesterday. I guess some of you just love me more than others...

Anyway, it reminded me of back in the day when we didn't have email and were pretty much forced to write letters. I have such a visceral reaction to that light blue air mail paper; as intercontinental phone calls were expensive, our au pairs wrote their friends and family all the time, and whenever I see air mail paper now I'm brought back to our (unrenovated) house. For some reason, in these memories it's always cold and I'm always about 11. Strange.

We had one au pair - I can't remember who - who was inspiringly OCD about her letter-writing. She had a big chart with names of friends and family down one axis and things that happened to her across the other. When she wrote about something to someone, she checked it off on the chart. How cool is that?

I think my fascination with letter-writing is partly why I enjoy keeping this blog. I don't like sending out mass emails, and mass snail mail kind of ruins the romance of pretty paper and a good pen. The blog lets me get out news while allowing me to send more personalized letters.

I think I need to make another stationery run.