The other day, I received a letter in the mail from an old college roommate of mine. This handwritten letter wished me a happy birthday and included other uplifting thoughts. When I began to read it, it engaged me to reminisce on all the great memories we had together. Unlike a phone call where you can tune out at times, there is something about reading a personally handwritten letter that makes you deeply appreciate that person. Taking the time to put pen to paper to create a handwritten note is powerful. It has the power to impress, encourage or brighten someone’s day.
I always find joy in receiving handwritten letters, but who wouldn’t? Growing up as a camp kid, I would await the arrival of letters from my mother or friends while spending a week away. I still have some letters from when I was in elementary school that I revisit every so often. In college, my roommate and I would write letters to each other before we would go out of town for the weekend. I knew when I got home from class I would have a handwritten letter from her slipped under my door. Even though they were written on notepads from the dollar aisle at Target (broke college kids; you know how it goes), I still kept every single one because I knew that college was flying by way too fast and I wanted to remember every second of it.
Writing a letter on nice stationery makes for a good keepsake. You can play phone tag with friends for weeks and not make any progress. Social media statuses and updates are fun to read, but quickly fall lower and lower on your newsfeed by the second. How about emails? Are you going to print out an email and put it in your scrapbook? The same goes for cell phones. Can you frame a meaningful text message to display in your living room? Do voicemails imprint themselves onto thank you notes? No, no and no.
So, I encourage people to try it. Pen down a few sentences to an old friend or relative you haven’t connected with lately. It’s a sure-fire way to make their day a bit brighter. Plus, isn’t it always nice to receive things in the mail that aren’t bills? Now of course designing stationery has biased me, but this is one of my favorites!
