I Owe Someone a Note

I’m listening to The Correspondent by Virginia Evans. I’m only partway through, so don’t worry. This isn’t a review, and there will be no spoilers.

One sentence made me stop and hit rewind.

“He was finding confidence behind the veil of ink on the page.”

That’s a beautiful line. It also made me realize how much of my life I’ve spent communicating through the written word.

One summer in high school, I came home from overnight camp corresponding with about fifteen girls. Long-distance phone calls weren’t an option. Fifteen nightly phone calls would have bankrupted my parents.

To keep eall the letters straight, I created a chart on a piece of cardboard. Down the left side were the girls’ names. Across the top were columns for the date each letter arrived and the date I mailed my reply. My personal correspondence log. Looking back, it may have been a little obsessive. At the time, it felt perfectly reasonable.

The cardboard disappeared years ago, which is probably for the best. Otherwise, one of my grandchildren might someday uncover it and conclude that Baba had been far more popular in high school than he actually was.

Letter writing eventually gave way to pathology reports, emails, newsletters, and blog posts. The audience has changed. The pleasure hasn’t. I still enjoy staring at a blank screen or a piece of paper, chasing an idea around until it finally behaves.

A few months ago, I found myself buying a box of correspondence cards on Amazon. Not birthday cards. Not sympathy cards. Just simple white correspondence cards with a gray border for thank-you notes and the occasional handwritten letter. The kind of stationery that practically insists you mind your manners.

In this era of texts, emails, Facebook posts, and emojis, buying stationery felt almost rebellious. But the cards are on my desk now, and every so often one finds its way into an envelope.

It turns out I never stopped being a correspondent. So excuse me, I owe someone a note.