Snail mail

I recently started exchanging letters with some of my friends - real, pen and paper letters. With a stamp on an envelope. It is actually quite a different experience from communicating over the internet, via chat or e-mail. And definitely different from skype or telephone. When you don't send it just by clicking a button (or enter), you think more about what you write. And you can add other cool things, like illustrations and drawings, not only emoticons. When I sit down to write a letter, I find I am so used to using emoticons to express myself using the written word that they sometimes sneak in. I think this is a testament to how much more (and more often) I write on computers than on paper when communicating with someone else through writing.

Writing a letter is a bit more challenging than just writing a note or a short e-mail. It is a relatively slow process, and you have to think about what you are writing and form it into a coherent structure with sentences, paragraphs, beginnings, and ends. At the same time, I like to write informal letters - letters where you just write down whatever you think about at that time and answer the questions from the letter you receive. That way, you become closer friends, by getting a piece of that person's mind at many different points in time.

It is lovely receiving letters, and you get more letters if you send more letters - that's my understanding of things, anyway. Actually, exchanging letters is kind of magical. Suddenly, collecting the post becomes exciting - has he or she written today? So, if you want some more excitement, awesome and lovely things in your life - start exchanging letters with a friend! Don't just hope you'll happen to be online at the same time on facebook, do something about it! Or get a pen pal, maybe from an exotic country or another culture. That way, you will learn about a new culture at the same time as making new friends! The postage does cost some money, but personally, I think it's worth it.