Old School

Letter writing is old school. Ollllld Schoooool. Writing a letter by hand on a piece of paper, putting it in the envelope, filling out the address, putting the stamp on. 

So much nostalgia. I haven't done it in so long. I have a lot of hand drawn blank greeting cards, cards I made myself, to sell as hand crafted items, you know? Well, they are just sitting there (not collecting dust, because I stored them properly, in sleeves) and I have a mission to write to a few people by snail mail. 

See, when every-modern-day-body communicates through social media, and you make a decision to cut out social media because it's heavily contributing to your poor mental health, you kind of lose communication with people.

Of course, this helps you realize who you really like communicating with because those will be the people you really, really miss. You miss their likes and comments and DMs and their own posts. 

And because I downgraded my phone to a flip phone to help keep me off the internet, texting is....problematic. If you've never had to text on an old style cell phone (as opposed to the ubiquitous smart phones of today) you would lose you're mind trying to do it. 

So...as I'm officially a classic this year (fifty years old) and can remember how people communicated before even cell phones and email...I decided to do that. Honestly I don't like talking on the phone. I prefer writing letters, even if I get nothing back. 

So I wrote a letter today to my very best friend, on a card I had made myself, and I wrote out her name and address and my name and return address, and looked up the postage to make sure, and put the stamps on (it was a larger card), and walked outside.

Yes, yes, I walked outside. I know. Oh, it is a really beautiful day today, it's so mild out...71 degrees F and sunny and my moss roses and nasturtiums are blooming. I walked down the driveway and put the letter in the mailbox and put the flag up.

Do you kids know about the flag? The little red flag on the mailbox that lets the postal carrier know you have outgoing mail? Before I walked out there I was unsure if mailboxes even still came with flags and was thinking I would have to walk down to the post office. Yeah, I'll walk down the driveway happily toda, but going to the post office...I might have to talk to people...(shudder).

But the flag was there and when I put it up I had such a wave of nostalgia and quiet satisfaction.

Hm.