As a strong letter writer in my younger days, I have accumulated a stash of letters over my lifetime that I just can’t part with! My collection contains letters from family and friends long gone, who have penned chronicles of their day to day lives, special events and people or places they have seen. Some are intimate love letters, some are from sweethearts from the war front, and others tell of surviving the Great Depression…………………
A letter is a precious thing, a first-hand account of another person’s innermost thoughts at a given moment of time; a tangible record of direct, open communication between the writer and the reader.
A letter travels some distance from the author to the recipient, the envelope plastered with stamps, perhaps franked with the names of faraway places. Your letter is able to pass through time zones, across borders, sometimes via air or sea……..travelling from distant places I have only heard about! Words travel well, tucked safely inside their snug envelope, and often the receiver will take a few moments to sit down in a quiet place, perhaps with a cup of tea, before slitting open the envelope to read the precious contents.
Do you have a sense of anticipation when you hold the envelope in your hand – does it contain good, much anticipated news, or maybe bad, or sad, news? Perhaps you sniff the envelope to gain a quick scent of the origin of the writer, or maybe the envelope has a lipstick-stained kiss on it or the initials S.W.A.L.K.
Letter writers carefully select the words used in a handwritten letter as they seem to carry more weight that an impersonal typed letter. Reading words that have been scratched into the page or perhaps blurred when tears made the ink run really has a different kind of emotional impact on the reader. Consider also, the difference between a letter handwritten with violet or sepia ink to one printed via a modern digital printer.
All of my letters were previously gathered together in different sized bundles and tied together with various coloured ribbons, but, once my family realised what a treasure trove I had tucked away in assorted shoe and glove boxes, they insisted that each letter be placed into a Mylar protective sheet and stored in archival boxes as part of our collective family heritage. I am so delighted that they are interested in my earlier days, my travels and friends, and do understand that damp and silverfish could damage them.
I urge you to make a start on sorting through your letters and preserving them as a legacy of family heritage. Let me know about some of YOUR special letters!
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