Discover the Joys of an Intimate, Lost Art: Letter Writing
Why don’t we all resolve to write more letters this year?
Done with care, they can be the most intimate form of communication. Better than speech, because you often write things you might not say aloud. Better than the phone, because taking the time to write tells someone you’re exerting effort in their behalf.
I’ve had one great correspondent in my life, Bert Marshall, a guy I’ve known since we were 13 years old in Weeping Water, Neb., where my father was school superintendent. Our family left two years later, but Bert and I reunited briefly during college only to go our separate ways in the early ‘70s.
We still write, but we’re down to once a year, at best. What a comedown from the days when getting a letter from him would instantly brighten me, if only because he’s the funniest guy I’ve ever known and because we have a storehouse of sophomoric inside jokes and shticks that we (and only we) still find hilarious.
I regret not keeping every letter Bert wrote, but, luckily, a few have survived. To get myself in the mood for my New Year’s resolution, I browsed through them again this weekend for the first time in many a moon.
Here was one of his missives from 1976, postmarked Waitsfield, Vt.: “I fervently hope that someday you’ll acquire a sheep, so that you too will feel the elation and inner joy that I have experienced since owning my own goats. The rewards are many: they are gentle, intelligent, friendly and almost pet-like, and they excrete far less manure than your average cow or buffalo.”
I must have mentioned to him in a previous letter that romance was blooming: “And then, of course, there is the topic of matrimony, which we all know and fear. I sense an intimate relationship developing there, as the signature on your Christmas card was obviously forged. That’s one of the first sure signs of impending union, when the prospective spouse starts signing the greeting cards.”
He went on to say, “I am prepared, of course, to serve as best man. A lesser position I would be forced to refuse. I will require a suit of the finest garment, a glass of water, and my name printed in all caps wherever it appears in the service bulletin, and in all newspaper accounts.”
This one from West Hartford, Vt. in February of 1975: “I recently secured employment as a farm person, although I would have preferred becoming a psalmist. The farming profession has many distinctive features, not the least of which is manure.
“Manure, as you may know, is a putrid substance generally attributed to animals, pests, and other species. . . . Among my many duties on the farm, I am chief assistant in charge of manure maintenance. I constantly shovel it, scrape it, pitchfork it, spread it, step in it and wear it in my navel. For this I receive a modest hourly wage.”
In late 1974, he wrote to say: “Yes, I have taken a bride. Unfortunately, the judge thought I had said ‘bribe’ and immediately turned me over to the House Judiciary Committee.”
Apparently down on his luck in San Francisco in 1973, he lamented: “It seems that no one in this fair city wishes to have me in their employ. I have tried to be honest with all prospective employers by telling them straight-out my main goal in life is to become an idiot, but it is becoming quite clear to me that there is no place for honesty in this country these days; neither is there any great demand for idiots, as there seems to be an adequate supply.”
From Christmas, 1973: “I am happy to hear that you are getting into the holiday spirit. What a fine decision on your part. . . . Woody Allen’s new film ‘Sleeper’ opens here this Friday and I shall be there with pad and pencil in hand. When I first moved here, ‘Play It Again, Sam’ was at a theater nearby and I attended four showings in two weeks.”
He last wrote me about a year ago, just after my dad died. “My mother called last Saturday night with the news of Bud’s passing. After talking to her, I went out onto the porch and stared off across the yard, past the big apple tree, expecting, well, I’m not sure what I was expecting.
“What happened was that I quickly become overwhelmed with a profound sense of nostalgia. My memories of your days in Weeping Water are among the most vivid of my high school years and they came flooding back there on my porch. I saw your dad in the classroom and in the halls, at sporting events, in the old office, and I recalled again what a powerful positive influence he had on all of us. He was always the consummate educator, involved, caring, dynamic. . . . I lingered on the porch long enough to let the full force of our shared experience wash over me all over again and, having reaffirmed that it was good, I went back inside, saddened but renewed and somehow strengthened.”
Letter writing, my friends.
May you, like me, make an effort to reacquaint yourselves with its unique capacity to keep us all human.