Note #9 – Sending Love by International Post

I wrote a letter this week.

An actual, honest to goodness, written-down-on-paper-in-fancy-cursive-writing letter.  It was a thank you letter to someone I’ve never met in person, but who has made my life richer and better by what they put out into the world, and I wanted to let them know that I appreciated all they do.

Which has led me to think a lot about what we all choose to put out into the world.

And about the miracle of the post office.

I’ve spent a fair bit of time at the post office recently – picking up shipments of books, sending books to people and receiving the odd surprise package.

Long time fans of this blog (well, it has been eight weeks and that feels like a long time to me) will know that early on, I declared this blog to be the digital equivalent of a blanket fort and careful readers may have noticed in the post script of that particular blog, I requested that someone send me snacks. Preferably cookies.

So what should appear in my mailbox recently?  A package, sent by international post, full of freshly baked, home made cookies. (Chocolate chunk and coconut macadamia nut, in case you’re wondering.). They were from my uncle John and my aunt Kathleen, who were wintering in Florida and who wanted to let me know that they’d read my blog.

Now, technically speaking, they are not my aunt and uncle – I believe we are second cousins – but they are closer to my parents’ age, and I was brought up at a time when kids did not call adults by their first names. They were relatives though so we went with the honorific titles of aunt and uncle. (I am 53 years old and I still have a hard time calling my mom’s friends anything but Mrs. Light or Mrs. Taylor. Old habits, and manners you learned when you were ten, die hard.)

But I’m the big winner here, because even though John and Kathleen are not my actual aunt and uncle, they are exactly the sort of people who you wish were your aunt and uncle.

Let me tell you how cool they are.  When I was nine years old, my uncle John let me try his scuba gear.  (Okay, it was in like three feet of water and he was standing there hanging onto me and the air tanks the whole time but still…I was the only nine year old in town who had gone scuba diving that summer and I remember it still.)  Also, he played the drums and could do that awesome solo in Wipeout, which ranked pretty high on my scale of Coolest Things in the World.  My aunt Kathleen, who has the best, most contagious laugh of anybody I’ve ever met, was a surgical nurse for many years and hers was the last face I saw when I was put under anesthetic for a major surgery when I was 14.  Was I scared?  Not really, because my aunt Kathleen was there, so obviously everything was going to be just fine.

(This, by the way, is how it is when you live in a very small town – your aunt is the surgical nurse on your surgery and when you wake up, other members of your extended family who work in housekeeping or the kitchen drop by to see how you’re doing.  I never got into trouble as a kid, partly because I knew if I ever stepped out of line, four different people would have telephoned my mother and told her the whole story before I even got home.)

Anyway, my point is this – send something out into the world this week.  A gift, a letter, a wish, good thoughts, or, if you have time and are as good a baker as my aunt Kathleen, some cookies.  You have no idea the ripples that will spread from your small act.

Every little thing that you do matters.

P.

P.S.  Please send a new car.  Preferably something sporty.  Maybe red.