I used to be a prolific letter writer.
When I was young, I had pen pals. Real ones. You know, people who did not live anywhere near me with whom I exchanged regular pen and paper based correspondence through the U.S. postal system. I wrote pages and pages to each and every one of them and they wrote pages and pages back to me.
Those were the days before you started to see the random computer in schools or even in homes. You know, the 80′s. Oh, they were selling computers, but there wasn’t much that those dinosaurs could do back then. I remember learning to write Basic programs on our Texas Instruments computer which hooked up to the television to use for a monitor and saved your data to cassette tape at really irritating high-pitched squeals and that was only if your parents didn’t want to do something important like watch the news or Quincy or Remington Steele.
I wrote my first novel in high school by hand on loose leaf paper. I just wrote that to give you an idea of what I’m talking about. AOL was the first real social not-just-for-nerds-and-geeks e-mail system that started to conquer the non-college community and that was the early to mid-90′s.
I think that’s when the art of letter writing began to die.
When people began to be able to send each other short messages every day and get a quick response and it was so much cheaper than making that long distance phone call, there was no need to write pages and pages of anything any more. Heck, I find that some people’s sigs are longer than the actual message body, which is a big no-no for me — call it a pet peeve.
Now, there’s no excitement when I go to the mailbox. Why should there be? The only envelops in there are junk mail and bills. There’s no anticipation, no hoping that maybe today will be the day that I get that extra special letter from that extra special friend. I used to look forward to getting those envelops with my name on them. I would race off to find a good quiet place to sit and read the contents, to catch up with my long distance friend, to vicariously experience through those pages my friend’s life, my friend’s dramas, triumphs, trials, and defeats. Afterward, I would immediately begin thinking of what I would write in my reply; sometimes, I would tuck in little things I found for the receiver like a bookmark or stickers or a special pen and sometimes I would get things too. The important thing was that it was a wonderful experience, a physical kind of contact that you don’t get with these modern day so-called pen pals that take place through e-mail.
I miss those kind of good old days, those kind of friendships where you wanted to spill your soul into pages and pages and someone in another zip code wanted to share theirs. I miss the anticipation of hoping every day that the mailbox will hold a letter from your friend and not just bills and junk mail.
What’s strange about this whole moods is what got me started on this train of thought. Yesterday morning, I was listening to The Writer’s Almanac on NPR; they’ve been doing a series on love letters since Valentine’s Day is approaching, and yesterday’s love letter was Napoleon to Josephine:
“I have not spent a day without loving you; I have not spent a night without embracing you; I have not so much as drunk one cup of tea without cursing the pride and ambition which force me to remain apart from the moving spirit of my life. In the midst of my duties, whether I am at the head of my army or inspecting the camps, my beloved Josephine stands alone in my heart, occupies my mind, fills my thoughts. If I am moving away from you with the speed of the Rhone torrent, it is only that I may see you again more quickly. If I rise to work in the middle of the night, it is because this may hasten by a matter of days the arrival of my sweet love. … I ask of you neither eternal love, nor fidelity, but simply … truth, unlimited honesty. The day you say ‘I love you less,’ will mark the end of my love and the last day of my life. If my heart were base enough to love without being loved in return I would tear it to pieces. Josephine! Josephine! Remember what I have sometimes said to you: Nature has endowed me with a virile and decisive character. It has built ours out of lace and gossamer. Have you ceased to love me? Forgive me, love of my life, my soul is racked by conflicting forces.
My heart, obsessed by you, is full of fears which prostrate me with misery … I am distressed not to be calling you by name. I shall wait for you to write it. Farewell! Ah! If you love me less you can never have loved me. In that case I shall truly be pitiable.
Bonaparte
P.S. — The war this year has changed beyond recognition. I have had meat, bread, and fodder distributed; my armed cavalry will soon be on the march. My soldiers are showing inexpressible confidence in me; you alone are a source of chagrin to me; you alone are the joy and torment of my life.”
First of all, I have to say that for a supposed mad, out-of-control emperor, he certainly knew how to wear his heart on his sleeve. If you didn’t know this was that stumpy little weasel-looking guy with a…well, a Napoleon Complex, if you close your eyes and picture Brad Pitt or David Boreanaz or whoever-it-is-that-people-think-is-ridiculously-dreamy these days, if you close your eyes and picture your dream guy writing this letter to you, you’d have to admit that’s one hell of a be-still-my-heart-catch-my-breath-aching-to-touch-his-naked-skin romantic letter, isn’t it?
Come on, isn’t it?
Second, he wrote it himself, not some git in Hollywood or some sap who works for Hallmark. Napoleon actually wrote this letter himself. With ink and paper. He agonized over it, spilled his aching heart out to the woman he loved on pages and pages. He didn’t make it short and sweet; he expanded on every thought and feeling, drew her a picture with his words. He wanted to make sure she knew everything he felt and likely she was at home, waiting to receive a letter from him, to have that physical connection to reassure herself that he he was alive and well.
No one writes letters like that anymore. Not even emails. So many people are trying to reduce their communication to less than 140 characters that they have forgotten the art of letter writing and even the art of communicating. Sometimes, less is not better.
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