I love coffee and I love writing letters so it seems natural to me that the two should go together. Lord Byron once said, “Only in letter writing do we have solitude and society simultaneously” but Byron was wrong. I can enjoy solitude and society while writing letters in a coffee shop.

There I am sitting at my very own table. Even if there are empty chairs at my table no one ever intrudes. I am alone. That’s solitude. No bodies are sitting with me or talking to me, but I’m not completely alone. I have my letter friend and their letter which I am answering. That’s society. I also can enjoy people watching. It’s fun for me to see what people are wearing and who they’re talking to and what they’re doing at their own tables.

I write letters every day at home, but it’s nice to get out every now and then. I may not want to go to lunch or shopping or visiting friends, but I just might like to get out of the house, changing the scenery. For the price of a cup of coffee I can have a grand old time writing letters at a coffee shop.

Luckily there are quite a few coffee shops in my very own town of Hudson. I realize not everyone is so lucky. I have a Starbucks and a Panera and an independently run shop on Hudson’s Village Green. There’s also a Restore. But when I was out enjoying a Country Inn Day in the town of Burton, Ohio I stumbled upon a coffee shop that had a number of rooms within it and they were amazing. You’d think you were in someone’s home. Look and see what I mean.

Since I do try to spread the word about the pleasure of letter writing I’m happy to say that occasionally a person will come up to me and ask what I’m doing. This is the perfect opportunity for me to explain how I write letters every day, belong to a national letter writing organization, and make wonderful letter friends all over the world.

I am a writer, a letter writer, but a writer just the same. I remember the first time I realized I was a real writer. I was in a coffee shop in the town of Shaker Heights, Ohio. I was writing letters as usual when a very distinguished man walked in with his briefcase. He found a seat across the room from me. He got busy writing and I continued to write my letters, but at a certain point he got up to get more coffee. He came by my table , looked down at all my papers and he asked me if I was a writer too. I thought for a second and I said proudly, “Why yes, I am.” You don’t have to be publised to be a writer. You just have to write and that I do, every day. Maybe you’re a writer too or a wanna be writer. So write!

So, if you like to write, write! Write letters! Sharing doubles the joy. You don’t have to write a book for hundreds of people to read. Of course you can write a book, but as Mother Theresa always used to say, “It’s the one to one that matters.” You can do a lot of good sharing joy and communing with your fellow man by taking up pen and paper and writing to people you know one at a time. You can join The Letter Exchange and write to people you don’t know… at first. Someone once said, “Why do you write to pen pals, people you don’t know?” The answer was, “In writing those people I get to know them and turn them into great friends.

So write letters. Write letters in your Christmas cards. Write letters at home – at the kitchen table, at a desk in your study, in bed, write anywhere, but if you need to change the scenery a little, get out of the house, try writing letters in a coffee shop. You may run into some people you know and that could be fun, but just writing a letter to a friend is also fun and they’ll be so happy to hear from you.

Look into your heart and write… you’ll make your friend happy and then they’ll write back making you happy too.

Go ahead. Spread joy. Our world could use it!

Saturday, April 13th 2019

 

Actually my version of a book …

It’s 42 handwritten letters with art on 244 pages.  The book is a letter from me, Carol Ann McCarthy, to you.  Well, that’s not exactly right.  It’s lots of letters from me to you.  These letters are a lot like the letters I write every day to my many wonderful pen friends, but in this collection I don’t go off on tangents about this, that, and the other thing.  No, I stick to the topic of why I feel the art of letter writing is a worthwhile and wonderful activity.  I explain, with examples, how letter writing is a physical, social, intellectual and spiritual activity.  Why, in many cases it becomes a ministry.

 

In our busy lives it’s good to sit down once in a while and not only write but also dabble in art play.  Did you ever notice how many adult coloring books are on the market today?  But why buy a coloring book when you can have a lot of fun drawing and coloring your own pictures?  Adding pictures in the letters you write not only gives letter friends visuals of what you’re describing, but you have a lot of fun creating those pictures and coloring them.  Some people call this art therapy, but I call it art fun!

 

The letters in this collection have all sorts of art I created just for you, for every one of you.  The art will  give you ideas  for creating your own artful letters.  I’m sure you have plenty of ideas yourself, but sharing doubles my joy.

Along with the art I’ll share many of my favorite things, things I discovered along the way which add a lot of pleasure to my days.  Things like rituals – specifically a ritual for letter writing.  If we have the materials ready, on hand, and if we have a system for when to write, where to write, whom to write – then it’s pretty easy to be in the mood to write letters and to actually write them.

Letter writing is a physical activity because hand writing is a physical activity.  As we choose a favorite writing instrument it’s much like making music on a violin or piano.  We’re being creative.  As our hand moves sensually across the page sharing our thoughts, dreams  and every day trifles we can sip a cup of some yummy drink, put our feet up and relax.  Writing slowly helps us slow ourselves down and busy people need to slow down now and then.  Our handwriting is a little bit of ourselves that we send off to others like a lock of our hair.  It’s personal and in today’s world the personal touch is quite neglected.

Even if you have a lot of friends and a great family there’s always room for more lovely people in your life.  Letter friends can be some of those people.  I’ll tell you how you can make friends all over the world by writing letters, how you can find wonderful correspondents.  Letter writing will shrink your world into a friendly neighborhood.  You’ll have visits every day when the mail comes, letter friends from near and far will be dropping by to say hello, that’s if  you become a letter writer.  Letter writing is truly a great social activity and you don’t have to dress up, clean the house, or cook dinner for your letter friends.  You just have to look into your heart and WRITE.

There is physical pleasure involved in letter writing and letter writing is certainly a social activity.  We can cultivate pen friendships and even go off to meet these people if we like, but if we don’t like we don’t even have to know how our pen friends look.  Sometimes this is good for the very best person could be hiding within an unimpressive body. In letters it’s heart to heart that matters without physical looks interfering  – unless of course we want to share pictures.

But besides all the physical and social delight letter writing is a very intellectual activity.  Your letters will be as intellectual as you and your pen friends are.  You’ll meet people from tropical islands and big, glamorous cities, small country towns and foreign countries.  These people will share information about those places and about the things they love to do.  You will share your interests too be it a love for gardening, literature, music or sports.  Whatever.  You’ll have people to chat with about all sorts of interesting subjects any time, day or night.  In my collection of letters I’ll share some of the wonderful things I learned from pen friends.  Robert Louis Stevensom said, “The world is so full of a number of things I think we should all be as happy as kings.”  Sharing with your pen friends will make you feel as happy as kings or queens or princesses or princes – maybe happier.

Of course this collection of letters from me to you will contain some whimsy.  I’ll tell you how your pets can write letters to the pets of your friends.  Really!  My dog not only had a number of pen friends – others dog friends and even a cat by the name of Alice, but he wrote a letter for the collection.  It’s true, well, sort of true.  My dog and I will give you an idea or two on how to entertain your mail man with your whimsical animal letters.

But there’s more . . .my collection of letters will also explain how letter writing is spiritual, can even become a ministry.  In this one-to-one art form we can do so much for others as we show them we care.  We can encourage, praise, show understanding, offer inspiration.  We can be a friend.  We can share love.

In letter writing we share our spirit.  Letter writing may be a physical activity  but we do not need to be physically present in order to share our spirit.  There’s a time for in-person sharing and a time for sharing without physicality.  We can also read the letters of people from the past.  We’ll feel these people are writing to us even though they’re long gone.  Spirit transcends time and letters are lasting, more lasting than we are.  It’s quite magical.

My collection of 42 letters to you from me will talk about all these things and of course I encourage you to write your own letters, some of them to ME!  Gee, we can become pen friends if we’re not pen friends already.  Wouldn’t that be fun?  Sure it would.  So if you haven’t been finding enough letters in your mail box – or any letters in your mailbox for that matter, you just might like to buy my collection of letters from me to you.  They sell for $30 plus three dollars for postage and packaging if mailed off and away.

The letters will arrive in a big sturdy water-proof, tear-proof envelope complete with my return address so you can write back to me after reading one letter, or five, or ten, or all forty two.  This project was a labor of love for you know what I always say, or maybe you don’t, but I’ll tell you.  I’m always saying Sharing doubles the joy – because it really does.

The envelopes are on my desk waiting to be filled with 42 letters to you!   When your check arrives in  my mailbox the envelope will be on its way to your mailbox and these letters could be a unique gift for any person  interested in letters for they come complete with a  pen friend – me.

It’s been a pleasure sharing my collection of letters with you.

Sharing doubles the joy.

Carol Ann McCarthy

110 W. Streetsboro  Street 1B

 Hudson, Ohio 44236

The weather outside in my town of Hudson, Ohio is frightful.  It’s 32 degrees with snow, then sleet, but though the weather outside is frightful I’m having a delightful day with a number of my interesting pen friends who have come to call to keep me company.  There’s Randall from California, Jenna from Maryland and Margie from Nova Scotia.

Letter writers never need to feel lonely because even if it’s not a mail day, or even if no letters happen to arrive in the mail that day, a letter writer can still have the company of others as she or he enjoys writing a letter to an interesting pen friend.

And it’s not only the actual writing that’s fun when composing a letter.  There’s lots of fun to be had in creating the stationary for that letter.  I love to draw flowers on my letter paper and along the edge of the paper I tell my letter friend a little bit about that flower.  Just the other day a letter friend told me if she ever feels dreary she draws flowers.  It must be something about the beauty of the flower that gets into our spirit. Of course you could draw whatever appeals to you if flowers aren’t your thing, but I promise your drawing, whatever it is,  will amuse your correspondent.

There’s something about art play.  Lots of people are discovering coloring books for I see millions of them in bookstores these days, but who needs a coloring book?  Just draw and color your very own picture.  I know you can do it!

Practice makes improvement

But what’s especially magical about letters is how we can share ideas with people far away, people we would probably never meet in normal everyday life if it weren’t for letters.  It’s amazing to think with letters alone you can develop a best friend without ever leaving your easy chair.  All you have to do is join a letter writing group like The Letter Exchange. Then, even if the weather is far too unpleasant for you to venture out and socialize you can socialize from that easy chair while sipping a favorite drink as you sit comfy by the fire.

 It takes me months to wish all my pen friends a Happy New Year, but what a fun task.  In this world of texts and impersonal emails and Facebook messages I think it’s refreshing to sit quietly and think of one person at a time, writing to them, reflecting on and with them –  one to one.

If we make our letter pretty as well as thought-filled our penfriend will feel honored that we used our precious time to focus  on her.  Our letter becomes a friendly compliment.  Don’t you light up when you find a letter addressed just to you in your mailbox?  I sure do.

I learn a lot from letters too.  My pen friend Margie from Nova Scotia is married to a lobster fisherman.  Because of Margie I now know a lot more about lobsters and the life of a lobster fisherman.  Margie sends pictures too.  The pictures enhance her descriptions and make her letters even more interesting and enjoyable.  It’s good to keep learning and not only about things, but also about people and how differently their lives might be from our own.  Living in Hudson, Ohio I’d never meet a lobster fisherman, but thanks to letters I now have a personal relationship with one.

We’re all so different with so many different interests.  My pen friend Randall likes to draw as I do, and he also enjoys writing poetry.  So far he hasn’t gotten me into writing poetry, but you never know.  I might try to write a poem someday.  Randall  is educating me too, as Margie is.

Randall introduced me to Charles Baudelaire, a French poet of the past, his role model.  Charles advocated writing short poems and walking.  He loved walking through the streets of Paris. Who wouldn’t? I may not be writing poetry in the near future, but I will be walking the streets of Paris like Charles did because I will be spending a week in Paris with my family this May and I bought a book called Walks in Hemingway’s Paris.  I’m sure Randall and all my other pen friends will be hearing about these walks that I take and they will undoubtedly also be getting pictures from these walks.  Why? You know. Sharing doubles the joy.

Sharing is a good thing.  We humans were not created to live in isolation.  We can share with our family and local friends, but if you are a letter writer you can also share with lots and lots of other people.  Sharing will become a hobby in itself. What will you share? You’ll be sharing all sorts of things in your letters – your travels, your latest shopping adventure and that new swim suit you purchased.  You’ll share your dreams and your creative ideas.

You can share a picture of that French potato pie you made recently along with its recipe.  You can share anything and everything in your letters.  Others will share with you too.  It’s so fun!

My penfriend Jenna loves the writings of Jane Austen. I do too.  Do you?  She told me her love affair with Jane’s books began when she was 10 years old and her aunt gave her the book, Emma.  Do you have a favorite author or favorite book?  Most letter writers are also fond of books and books become a regular topic in letters.  Who needs a book club when your letter friends report on all their latest book adventures?  If you are a fan of Jane Austen Jenna suggests you find Jane’s History of England.  She says the book is quite “a trip”!  I’ll have to look for that book. Jenna’s got me curious.

So I hope you are a letter writer like me, enjoying all the pleasures this lovely old art provides , but if you aren’t, there’s no time like the present to get started.  Write your old auntie.  Write your friend who moved away.  Write a letter to  anybody at all.  Sit quietly.  Doodle a little drawing on the paper,  maybe even write a short poem as Charles Baudelaire and Randall suggest.  Join The Letter Exchange and connect with people from all over the world.  You’ll be glad you did when you go to your mailbox and find lots of letters addressed just to you.  And you WILL find these letters for there’s an old saying – when you give good things come back to you. Give a letter.  Get a letter.

You’ll see.

Recently I was reading a book called “A History of American Literature since 1870”, and in that book Mark Twain and his work was discussed at length.  Upon reading a passage from Twain’s “Old times on the Mississippi” in which he described the home town of his youth, Hannibal, Missouri, my thoughts instantly traveled to one of my pen friends.  You see, my pen friend Greg also makes Hannibal is home.  Greg is very proud of Mark Twain and rightly so.

Every one of Greg’s letters is marked with  a Mark Twain postage stamp.  He even sent me a sheet of Mark Twain stamps so I too could post my letters to him using these stamps.  Needless to say, anytime the name Mark Twain comes up in conversation, or in any other way, Greg comes to mind.  He lives far away from me.  We’ve never even met in person, but through letters I’m getting to know Greg quite well, better than any of my next door neighbors in my town of Hudson, Ohio.  Greg’s out of sight, but not out of mind.

How is it we can cultivate meaningful friendships without physical contact?  We can do this easily if we share our true spirits through thoughtful, written conversation. In fact, sometimes it’s easier to get to know the heart of a person if we’re not distracted by physical appearance. Physical first impressions can color what we hear a person saying. For that very reason I don’t ask to see pictures of  my new correspondents met through friendship books ( little handmade booklets filled with names and addresses of people interested in getting to know each other through the mail.  These little booklets are sent from one letter friend to another.) or through The Letter Exchange (an organization which introduces letter writers to each other). Sometimes years go by before I have any idea what a pen friend looks like. Sometimes I never know, but yet sight unseen, I can feel that pen friend is a best friend.  After all, poets tell us Letters mingle souls  and how nice it is to rid ourselves of the physical now and then.

Friendship is a wonderful thing and there are so many kinds of friendships – school friends, work friends, relatives, neighbors, friends who share our hobbies, old friends and new ones. They’re all great!  But letter friends can become some of the best, and I maintain –  the more the merrier.

Though we may seldom, if ever, get together with a pen friend in person, we may know them quite well if they’ve shared their personal stories and feelings in their letters to us.

Sark, in her book, “Succulent Wild Woman” writes, ” A story can travel without you and inspire many.  The tiniest story in your life can deeply touch another.  You cannot know the effect your story may have.” But whatever effect stories shared in letters have, we can be sure these stories help people get to know each another.

And this makes me think of a song with lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II

Getting to know you, getting to know all about you;

Getting to like you, getting to hope you like me.

Getting to know you, putting it my way, but nicely.

You are precisely my cup of tea.

Getting to know you, getting to feel free and easy;

When I am with you getting to know what to say.

Haven’t you noticed suddenly I’m bright and breezy?

Because of all the beautiful and new

things I’m learning about you

Day by day.

While going through my attic the other day I came upon my old, blue typewriter.  What did it make me think of?  It made me think of my lovely pen friend Amy.  Amy lives in Pennsylvania. Though Amy is quite the modern woman she enjoys typing on her old typewriter now and then just for fun, and wouldn’t you know, Amy’s typewriter is blue just like mine.  Amy writes terrific letters and she’s quite the artist too.  Her stationery is always a delight to behold. Letter writers do appreciate lovely stationery and we love letters that look as good as they read.  Amy’s letters are the best!

And whenever I make a cup of tea who do you think comes to mind?  It’s my pen friend Kim, also from Pennsylvania.  Kim loves traveling to England and Scotland and she loves taking tea in those places.  She has sent me lots of pictures from her travels – tea houses and the tea goodies she enjoys there. Getting her letters with these photos is such fun.  I look at her pictures and my imagination kicks in.  I feel I’m with her, sharing my tea, not in my kitchen, but in Scotland or England at some cozy tea house. What fun, and I have my pen friend Kim to thank.

And if I’m out in nature I’m always thinking of my pen friend, Janet.  Janet lives in Virginia. She loves nature as I do and she also loves to photograph nature so every one of her letters is filled with pictures of the things she recently saw when out on one of her nature expeditions.  One picture is truly worth a thousand words, but she adds eloquent  verbal descriptions of those pictures ( she’s a former English teacher so of course Janet’s a great writer.) I’m getting to know Janet quite well, but also the nature world of Virginia, thanks to Janet’s letters.

There are so many lovely people in the world and I’m so pleased to be writing to many of them … people like Michelle in Washington D.C..  She has the most beautiful handwriting.  When we’re not writing each other we both enjoy intimate sharing in charming places.  No wild parties for us or loud, noisy restaurants where you can’t think or barely hear the person sitting beside you. Michelle and I are kindred spirits.

Michelle is forever kind and shows an interest in many things.  I’m one of those things, as are her other correspondents, and it’s very comforting to know there are people out there who care about me?  I care about Michelle too and all my many pen friends.  Caring about others is a wonderful thing.  We step out of our own lives and concerns, focus on someone else, and return to our own life with renewed contentment.

Pen friends may live far away but through letters their spirit surrounds us at all times bolstering us up and helping us feel rich.  Our pen friends may be out of sight, but they are seldom out of mind. I hope you have a pen friend, or better yet, lots of pen friends.

Letters shrink the world into a friendly neighborhood.