I have always loved the beauty of writing letters. Today I wrote the most difficult one of my life. I think it is important to think about why we write letters. For one it is a beautiful way to tell someone how we feel, how we feel about them, how we feel about life.
I had an old pal I used to write when he and I were kids, and he would go on summer vacation. By the time we were back in school we had each written around five letters to each other. I suppose that was some sort of love, we were two young boys, neighbors inseparable when together. I remember trying to get another neighbor boy to join us – we were a trio at the time. He thought it was stupid and that would be a sticking point in our friendship up to this day.
I had a girl I wrote letters to after we parted ways. This was in college – we wrote to each other frequently. I would ask her what book she was reading, and she would tell me, and then she would ask me about my writing and I would say I was trying. She told me one time when she was now living with someone, she read my letter walking up her long gravel driveway so she could hide it before her boyfriend saw it. He didn’t like my letters. We wrote to each other for years afterward, until one day I asked her to move to my city. She responded with a reaction that scared me so much, I never wrote her again. I have always regretted that. I still have her letters.
I encourage you to write a letter to someone you care about. Write it with all of the passion you felt when you were with them. Words are important, but people in our lives are far more important. A letter is a way of telling them so, even if the words contain sometimes painful realities. They are still what we mean and generally bleeding with compassion.
Write someone you love a letter!
