They tumbled down from the shelf above, and as I realized what they were, memories that were buried deep inside came tumbling back. I sat down on the floor amidst the pile of paper strewn around me – some were faded, some were torn, and some were still as fresh as the day they had been sent. To anyone passing by, they would have appeared to be just a pile of junk; but to me, they represented an era gone by, one which the current generation is very unfortunate to have never known.
Letters were a part of my life for more than two decades, from the time I went away to boarding school at the age of six, until the day a monster called email sneaked up from nowhere and obliterated them forever. I don’t recall the first one I ever received, but I’m sure it was from my mom – she wrote to me and my siblings religiously every week, up until the time we went away to college and she could call us over the phone. And over the years, I got into the habit of keeping the ones that had special meaning – the ones from a dear friend who would spend her waiting time at airports to write me thick letters - pages and pages that were written on both sides, the ones from a favorite teacher who wrote to me up until the day she succumbed to the ravages of cancer, the greeting cards that were sent for birthdays but which doubled as letters because they had every inch of free space written over, the very rare letters from my dad which I both wanted and didn’t want because I knew if he was writing to me, it was only because mom was not well enough to do so and she would insist that dad keep up her weekly tradition, the card from a high school crush which conveyed much more than the few words written on it signified, the letters from my cousins who were only writing because they wanted the latest gossip from their sisters in the all-girls school right next to their all-boys school, the ones from old best friends you had to leave behind because you moved to another school, bittersweet because you knew you missed each other even though they were making new friends just as you were, and many, many more.
There was an unexplainable joy in receiving letters – they reminded you that you featured in someone’s thoughts, someone who took the trouble and time to put pen to paper and write you a few words. While at school, it was always lunch time when the letters were handed out, and you could visibly discern the anticipation or disappointment on the faces around you – the former couldn’t wait to tear open the envelope and read what was written inside while the latter had to resign themselves to wait another day for news from loved ones.
And today, we are stuck with email; not that I have anything against email – in fact, it’s a great way for faster and almost-instant communication – just that it has no personality and does not generate the same excitement that letters did. There’s no distinguishable handwriting, no fancy letter paper and scented envelopes, and nothing other than the address to tell you who it’s from. And in what seems like an irony, the quicker email always contains less news than the slowpoke letter – it’s as if people don’t have time to share news anymore, even though they save tons of it through instant communication.
I felt a wave of nostalgia wash over me as I read a few from my collection again – some showed signs of having been read again and again over the years, some had tear stains that had made the ink run and washed away many of the words, and some brought a smile to my lips as I remembered the circumstances under which they had been written.
Nostalgia is a funny thing – we yearn for the good old days even as we know there is no going back. Instant food may not taste as great as that which has been prepared from scratch, using ingredients that were freshly ground using mortar and pestle, but who has the time or the inclination today to go to so much trouble to prepare a single meal? We’ve learned to compromise, we’ve adjusted to change, and we’re going along with the flow so we don’t get left behind. And so we’re resigned to using email, Facebook, IM, phone calls and text messages today to stay connected, and we have to accept that there will soon come a time when we’re going to become nostalgic about these forms of communication too because they’re sure to be replaced with something more sophisticated and innovative.
They say you shouldn’t live in the past, but when your past is filled with wonderful memories, it’s not a crime to take a peek into the treasure chest you’ve saved those recollections in, from time to time, and smile to yourself or share them with a loved one. My collection of letters may fade with the passage of time, but the memories they evoke will remain evergreen for as long as I live!
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