When Was the Last Time You Sent a Love Letter?
When was the last time you sent a love letter? And I use the term 'love letter' loosely...
If you didn't think that a handwritten letter could change someone's life then you've never met Hannah Brencher.
Hannah has written three books but her global community: The World Needs More Love Letters has found a place in my heart.
Her first book is a memoir about living in New York City and feeling so alone that she started to write, what she called, love letters to people to let them know that they were seen.
She thought that other people had to be feeling the way she was...alone.
Sending letters and cards to people in my life has been a passion for as long as I can remember. And it seems that in the past 12-months I've been on a mission to find stories from other people who feel the way I do about sending a little love in the mail.
A few weeks ago a young woman came into the shop and she fell in love with our card selection and bought several cards for special people in her life. She confided in me that she loved sending cards to her friends but unfortunately they weren't avid card or letter writers.
Even though she said she was used to it...her face told me otherwise.
On a different day...A woman came in the shop to purchase a birthday card for her daughter-in-law. She asked me if all my cards were blank on the inside. I said they were and that there was blank space on the inside to write a nice little note. She told me she was looking for a card that already had writing inside...she was a 'boy' mom and she wouldn't have the slightest idea what to write to a girl.
I wonder if sometimes people don't send cards or letters because they just don't know what to say?
I have to admit that I am not the most eloquent letter writer...and as I constantly remind myself, it's not about writing the perfect note. It's about sending the note itself and saying...hey, I was thinking about you. It can really be as simple as that...
"I was thinking about you so much that I am sitting down here right now and writing you a little love note, addressing it and putting a stamp on it and dropping it into the mail for you. Because I want you to know that you're on my mind."
And as it always happens, to the people I send notes to, they reach out and say...'how did you know I needed to hear that' or 'how did you know that I needed that hug in the mailbox today?' Just like that it reinforces why I send happy mail through the USPS!