“Why write holiday postcards,”was the recurring question from people around me this summer, when they observed the many hours that I spend writing cards, also the addresses. “You can print those nowadays, you know.”
To me, however, this offers a yearly moment of reflection. Noticing that I haven’t seen someone for a(nother) year, I become acutely aware if not having seen the person makes me sorry or not. Ever so often I stop writing, but usually the mailing list gets longer every year, with good memories attached.
In some cases it also provides a good exercise. Especially if the interaction wasn’t all that smoothly in the past year, I force myself to keep searching until I find something that I can truthfully thank the other for. And I write that down.
If you read this, and you unexpectedly didn’t get a card, I probably lost your address, or Outlook did something funny. Please drop me a mail at jac@rongen.com with your snail-mail address , and I will be thinking of you next year as I write an old fashioned postcard.
The Swedish Mail has developed a new approach to sending cards, and uses Facebook and other applications in an ingenious way to automatically produce postcards that are supposed to convey a feeling of intimacy.
naar Nederlands