It is such a joy to receive a posted handwritten letter
There is something lovely these days about receiving a letter, written to you with social purpose, and not because you need to pay a bill. Remember the days when you’d receive letter-writing packs for Christmas? Back before email and text and keyboards. Back when handwriting was practiced continually because there was no other format, unless you clunked away on a typewriter.
I used to adore writing letters to my friends when I was a child. We would pop stickers all over them, too – puffy stickers, scented stickers, full-on 1980s’ stickers. And the excitement when the postman came was overwhelming.
Especially as there was also the second post to look forward to if the first revealed nothing in a patterned, scented envelope and you had to hang on that bit longer.
There is an extreme satisfaction to opening a letter and sitting down to carefully read the news of your friend or loved one.
These days, however, the lost art of letter writing is slipping further into the pre-1990s past. For many years
my children used to write thank-you letters and cards for any gifts that they received, but these days they are at an age where they don’t even bother with Christmas cards to their friends.
There is more care and effort in a letter, which is probably another contributory factor as to why our everlazier society has more or less done away with them.
Having to sit down and keep your writing neat, think of what to say, buy stamps, get to a post-box and so on, requires far more attention than banging out a Facebook status or texting someone.
I recently received a letter from a reader about a column that I had written regarding neighbours.
I am very fortunate to live surrounded by friendly folk whom I have known for years, but I had written about the eyesdown approach of many neighbourhoods these days.
Sadly the second page of the letter was missing from the envelope and therefore anonymous, but I’d like to say a huge thank you to whoever took that time and effort.
It was much appreciated.