The Lost Art of Letter Writing

My mother will be 100 years old this year. Goodness, that makes me feel old too ! I have applied for a congratulatory letter from The White House and, since she was born in England, one from the Queen (actually my brother put in that application). I am not an admirer of President Bush, but have put aside my political feelings, since I know it will please my mother !!

Last year, when she was 98 1/2 (yes, as you get very old you go back to halves !!) I could no longer care for her, so with very mixed feelings, and a great deal of guilt, I found a small board and care home for her. After doing so I had to pack up all her possessions so her house could be rented out to provide income for her care. My mother had kept most of the letters sent to her over the last part of her life, and a few from earlier years, and they are all piled in a large purple plastic container. Yesterday I decided to go through them to discover any snippets of information about our family history, that they might contain.

That got me thinking about the fact that no one writes "real" letters any more. It used to be such a thrill to go to the mailbox and find a handwritten letter from one of the family, or an old friend. Even a typed letter, though not as personal, was exciting to receive. Sometimes I print out my own email letters, or email I receive, if I think they might be interesting for posterity, but somehow a handwritten letter is much nicer. Handwriting is so distinctive and just holding a handwritten letter brings strong memories of the person in a way that a typed letter doesn't. Just one glance and you can tell who it is from if you have seen their handwriting before. I have some books on handwriting analysis and it gives amazing insight into a person's personality.

The purple box is filled to the brim with letters from some of my mother's brothers and sisters (she had seven), letters from myself, my children, my brother, some of her old friends. There are letters from my stepfather, written in the early years of their relationship when my mother visited family in England on several occasions. Letters from an old boyfriend and his mother. It is sad to think that since the advent of email all that will be lost. I am just as guilty as the next person, since I haven't written a personal letter for some years and even when I do I almost never use a pen, since I have arthritis in both the middle fingers of each hand, which makes my writing look rather crabbed unless I am very careful. It also seems that writing a letter with a pen provokes more thought and brings forth more detail than one would write in an email. You have a piece of paper of a certain size to fill, so look for information that will fill it up.
Unfortunately over the past ten to 15 years all that has been lost. Time to rummage for some writing paper and start again !!