Mail Ego

can i tell you how much i love getting mail?

i don't know what it is, but ever since i was a little kid i'd get so totally stoked when i'd come home from school and find something...anything...with my name on it. granted, before i was 12 it was usually a magazine, like Highlights or Boy's Life , but occasionally it was a birthday card from my grandmother in Florida, etc. even when the mail wasn't for me, per se, i'd get happy: catalogs from Harriet Carter (the mail-order dollar store of the 80's) or Sharper Image (which i don't remember us ever shopping at, but somehow always got catalogs from), or my mom's magazines (i was particularly fond of Family Circle and Good Housekeeping. what can i say; i was a homemaker in training who happened to love reading through the recipe sections and "Hints from Heloise").

later on, when i was a senior in HS and all my friends had gone off to college, we would exchange letters via snail-mail (this was the land before e-mail, kids). i never felt more connected and elated than when i saw a letter waiting for me from MS or Tricia or Jon; it was reading their handwriting and comments in the margins, hearing their voices and little pictures that were usually attached that totally made for the best letters, no matter how brief.those letters, more than anything else, helped our friendships to flourish while they were away at school (i'll be honest, i think i finally got rid of most of those letters when i moved in with Stephen 3 years ago). then came the boom of e-mail, but it wasn't the same. i'd get happy to get e-mails, but it was a different feeling than reading a letter.

the closest thing to that feeling i used to get from reading their letters is reading my friends' blogs. it's similar, but also not quite the same...

nowadays, the only mail i ever get is bills, Christmas cards and my monthly $5 certificate from Best Buy. however, we got back our 1st response card last night, and you had to see me at the mailbox, hopping up and down, all excited. i was even more excited when i saw the message that the sender had written on it. i'm at the edge of my seat, knowing that every day we'll be getting more responses!