Connections

I recently had the pleasure of attending a lunch with an interesting assortment of friends and to explain all the connections at the table I would need some photos, a corkboard, pushpins, and some red string. At the table were two librarians, three novelists, and two book podcasters. Of course we're all more than those things, but that is the simplest way to distill it. One of the people I'd met in a playgroup when our now 18-year-olds were babies, one of the people at the table I'd known since I was 18 myself, one I'm not positive I'd met before that lunch, and one I don't remember when I first met, but our paths keep crossing and we know many of the same people. (This does not cover all the people.)

Many of the connections with people around that table were initially formed or enhanced back in the days when several of us had regularly-updated mommy blogs. From pen pals to blog posts, writing has been a way for me to connect throughout my life.

As I've certainly said before - I am interested in this still being a place to reflect and connect. It's clear, looking at my old posts, that I've struggled to do that as my children have gotten older and it's felt less appropriate to share their stories in this space. So if anyone is still checking here occasionally, I am still here. And updates will continue to be sporadic, but I'm not ready to completely let go just yet.

Special Delivery

I'm wondering how you use your mailbox...

Two Postcrossing postcards waiting for the mail carrier this morning.

I place outgoing mail in ours at least once a week. I mail birthday cards, actual letters to faraway friends, notes of encouragement, etc. I still love putting a pen (or marker!) to paper and take care in choosing cards, paper, stickers, stamps. It is all meaningful to me, even if some of that meaning is lost on the recipient. 

In the last few months I have joined Postcrossing which is a way to send and receive postcards from all around the world. I've had it in the back of my mind ever since Swistle blogged about it years ago and finally decided it would be a great way to use some of the postcards I've collected over the last twenty years. 

Not long ago a coworker thanked me for something I'd sent her in the mail and commented that she didn't get it right away because they aren't good about checking their mailbox. That was a completely absurd notion to me because I still look forward to the mail every day. Most days it's just junk/bills and, in the last couple of years, random college mail; but sometimes there's a letter or a postcard with my name on it and that is no less thrilling than it was when I was twelve years old. 

It would be difficult to ignore the mail in our current home because it drops directly into the living room:

So I'm curious, are you still mailing things?