A Month of Letters & A Month of Letters
February 1, 2014 § 4 Comments
A few days before the new year, my grandmother made the difficult decision to go on Hospice care. As a result, January has been a time of mixed sadness and lovely moments and gratitude for family and reminiscing. I’ve been fortunate to be able to visit with my grandmother nearly every week since the end of December, but one day out of seven hasn’t felt like enough. So, I’ve been writing letters to her. Not every day, but more days than not, I’ve mailed off postcards, cards, and letters most of which have recounted memories of visiting her house over the years. She’s been enjoying receiving them, I’ve been enjoying writing them, and they’ve sparked points of connection that extend beyond the two of us. A couple weeks ago when I was visiting, a cousin of mine told me that she’d read one of my letters in which I’d described the things in our grandmother’s front hallway that I’d loved when I was growing up. She said it was like reading something she’d written, because her childhood memories of the points of interest in that hallway are very similar to mine. Upon hearing this, my grandmother beamed at us and said how nice it was for everyone to be able to share memories and get to know each other better at the same time. Isn’t that a lovely truth?
January was a beautiful month of letters for me personally.
February, as you may know, is A Month of Letters in a much larger way.
In past years, while this brainchild of Mary Robinette Kowal has inspired me to sit down to letter writing more consistently, I’ve never quite met the challenge of sending a letter each day the mail runs in February. This year, I think it’s going to happen. As well as continuing to write to my grandmother, I plan to write reminiscing letters to other people who are dear to me. And, in keeping with the rules of the challenge, I’ll catch up–and keep caught up–on my replies, too.
In preparation for A Month of Letters, I’ve spent part of this afternoon sorting out my stack of letters awaiting responses and organizing my writing supplies (they’d fallen into a rather catawampus state). I unlocked my first two achievements and I’m ready to fill the month with letters. Anyone else playing along this year?
Scribbling Glue 
While this will be my 3rd year participating and I’ve really enjoyed finding ways to connect and send my letters, notecards or postcards, you have inspired me even more. I have been getting organized just like you and throughout have been thinking of what I can send and say to my Mother-In-Law. I remarried 5 years ago and met the most wonderful fun loving person to share family stories of years gone by. My MIL is 88 1/2 and we just found out she has Stage IV lung cancer. She feels fine right now, but we know it is just a matter of time. We are going to make the trip to see her in the next week or so, but I’m hoping to give her something to look forward by sending cards. One added hard part is she doesn’t have very good vision, so I think short printed notecards and postcards will work best. I am also going to print our family pics and make them into postcards. I lost my grandmother two year’s ago and while I sent some packages and cards, I wish I would have written more. Thanks so much for sharing your story.
I’m certain your mother-in-law is going to be thrilled to be showered with mail, memories, and love. One of the pluses of writing frequent short notes is that you can focus on a single memory or share a single photo each time, so you keep touching base without running out of thoughts and ideas of what to send. Enjoy the Month of Letters!
I think it’s a very good idea to share this memories with your grandma. I guess she’s very happy reading your texts, they might bright her days. Don’t stop doing that.
Yes, I’ll definitely keep sending memories!