I can still remember the excitement I felt as a little boy when my mom would tell me that a letter had arrived in the mail for me. “Really? For me?” I would stop whatever it was I was doing and run down to the kitchen, where she would usually be with the letter. Someone had written to me, Benjie. Not my brothers… ME! Wearing a grin that I tried unsuccessfully to hide in hopes of covering up my excitement and curiosity, I would tear open the letter. The first step of course was a peek to see who the letter was from. Was it my grandma, Gaggi, who lived in South Africa? Someone from my dad’s family in New England? Or maybe from a friend who had moved away? Once I answered that question, I would then work my way back to the top to see what they had said, often reading and re-reading it, especially if it was from someone I really missed. I loved getting these letters, and while many of those letters have unfortunately since been lost, some remain with me to this day, in a box under the guest bed.
Have you experienced this recently? You open the mailbox and notice that amidst the bills, magazines, and marketing, lies something unique, something beautiful. Like a candle in a dimly lit room, it shines out to you, beckoning for you to grab hold of it. Someone has written your name, in their handwriting, on a card for you, and you alone. Glorious. Or perhaps you check your email inbox, expecting nothing but nonsense and see a note from a name that you recognize, not writing you for business, networking, email distribution, or anything other than to write you an email. In a reversal of fortune, the impersonal world of mail and email has returned to its roots, just for a moment, and you are the beneficiary. You see, receiving a letter instills a subconscious sense that someone out there cares for you in ways that a phone call or text message simply does not. A letter can make you feel loved, important, cared for, special, because it took effort and intentionality. A curious, engaging email can stop you in your tracks, pulling you out of the glazed over, screen-induced comatose we who work behind screens fall under. Yet sadly, from my personal experience, letters and purposeful, personal emails are fewer and farther between then they have ever been.
I’ve thought about this often over the last few days, as I was going through my old emails and uncovered an email that Gaggi (who has since passed away) had written to me while I was away at school in 2011. It was not my birthday, or any special day for that matter, rather she had written me an email purely to share with me what was going on in her life and to ask how about mine. She shared stories, ostensibly trivial ones, about my cousins, aunts and uncles. How they were doing, what fun they were having, what silly things they had said. She told me that my uncle Pete had broken the angel that was supposed to go on top of the Christmas tree, and that they had had quite a discussion figuring out whether to leave a beer or a Coke for Santa. She spoke about herself, what she was enjoying and how much she missed us, and how glad she was to be back in her home after a busy holiday season. She signed off saying that she hoped to see me at my graduation in a few months, and that she loved me very much, even from far away.
Dearest Benj, I dreamt about you last night and woke up with the urge to write to you — I get all your news from your mum but now I want it from you !
But I haven’t got your address so I am typing this on my Word page and hope like mad I can find out how to send it when I get your address !
I got back from Cape Town ten days ago — in time for George’s birthday — she’s into double figures now and in the senior primary school — and /Timothy’s yesterday —and it was his first day at school !!
Had a great time in the Cape — having not spent any time at all down there last year it was special for me to have time with the boys – . The day after I arrived we all went up to Britannia Bay — a glorious little hamlet up the West coast – the weather was magnificent – the beautiful blue sea was as calm as a millpond and even I could go for a swim without getting dumped . No shops around — we all just spent our time swimming, walking on the beach — silver, like caster sugar — not like our south coast beaches which are golden and much coarser ! We played a lot of cards and Scrabble and read — Max got a bit bored — “after you’ve swum at least twice and walked on the beach what else is there to do??” — I said read and he did !!
We went back to Cape Town and the Saulez arrived — exciting last preparations for Christmas — carrots for the reindeer, mince pies for Father Christmas and big discussions whether to leave him a beer or a coke !! Buying and setting up the tree — poor old Pete dropped the angel while trying to fix her at the top of the tree — he spent the next day trying to glue her together again — he did a great job — although she still has a hole in the top of her head ! With all the lights lit and all the decorations in place, the stockings filled and all presents in the correct places the Linley family room looked wonderful and those childrens’ faces when they came in on Christmas ;morning was such a joy to see. We had a real fun day – Lucy and John joined us later and so did Pete’s nephew, Mark and his niece Jane and her husband. great seeing you guys on Skype — I am definitely getting someone in to teach me how to access my Skype — that’s one of my projects for the next week.
An excerpt from the email Gaggi wrote me on January 25, 2011
Truth be told, I don’t remember receiving this email, or any of the other ones she sent me. (Upon further searching, there were quite a few). And yet reading them now, 15 years later, it feels as if she is alive again, on the other side of the computer, writing to me. That’s what makes a letter special… it can change its meaning over time, a gift that keeps on giving. Sitting down and reading her words brings her back to life in a mysterious, marvelous way. I can picture her sitting at her desk in her little home, frustrated with the internet and her email, opening a Word document for backup because she wasn’t sure her email would get through. I can imagine her antics, her facial expressions, the cup of tea she undoubtedly was drinking, and the pride she felt thinking of her grandson far away. I can see the places and people she writes of vividly, hearing their laughter and glimpsing their smiles. And yet I can’t help but wonder if any of these pictures or images would come to mind so clearly if she had the ability to pick up her phone and FaceTime me back then, instead of writing to me like she did.
In his book The Life We’re Looking For, author Andy Crouch says that all inventions promise answers to two statements; “Now you’ll be able to” and “You’ll no longer have to”. Applying this thought process to the invention and improvement of the phone, and more recently FaceTime might sound like this. FaceTime and phone calls promise that you can contact anyone, anywhere, at any time. Not only can you contact them, but you can see their face while doing it! You’ll no longer have to wait to share good news or see someone’s face until the next time you see them in person. You’ll no longer have to imagine your distant loved ones’ faces when you tell them you’re having a child, or that you’ve gotten a huge promotion. The physical distance between us all feels less significant and more manageable. I know that the relationships I have with family and friends who don’t live near me have, in the short term, undoubtedly benefited from the ability to call and FaceTime. Considering that I’ve lived away from home since high school, I’m deeply grateful for these modes of communication, and am not interested in a world without them.
On the surface, this appears to be a win-win. Yet Crouch also states that there are two other important reflections to account for as well with each invention; “You’ll no longer be able to” and “Now you’ll have to”. These are the unforeseen shackles that new advancements quietly place on us if we aren’t careful. Applying these reflections to this situation might look like this. I wonder if we’ll no longer be able to remember, recall, or relive moments like we could before, when we had written record of them. For instance, say someone calls you tonight… If you don’t pick up the call, or you aren’t able to concentrate during it, you miss out on the conversation and there’s no real way to get it back. Truth be told, I sometimes get so distracted on a FaceTime that I’ll start scrolling on my phone, while I’m talking to someone dear to me. Do you do this as well? I can no longer reliably remember what it was my mom and I spoke about even a week ago when she called me. Don’t believe this? Or another example: can you remember what you spoke about a year ago on the phone when you called your mom, dad, sister, brother, for their birthday? Can you remember what they were doing that day, how they celebrated, who was with them? Perhaps you can, but I certainly cannot. Yet if you could pick up a letter, or read an email about those same questions, perhaps your memory would be jogged in ways that bless you again and remind you to reach back out and follow up to see how things might have changed.
What about “Now you’ll have to”? I wonder if we’ll have to live in a world where we don’t have written record of the small moments of our lives that make life special. Where we don’t remember those trivial moments as easily, and we find it challenging to recall our lives and the lives of our loved ones. Where we forget just what we were doing and how we were living, and the little victories and moments and sadnesses. This might have significant trickle-down impact. Think about all the fascinating historical characters and stories we know so much about, thanks to the letters that were written to and by friends, family, colleagues, and even people they didn’t agree with. What will we know about ourselves and our children in 50 years? What will we remember of the small, daily moments that made our lives special? Will it be by referring to what we tweeted about? The carefully curated Instagrams, TikToks, and Facebook posts that are a mirage of what life truly is and was like? Perhaps this is catastrophizing, perhaps it is not. Who’s to say? Either way, I believe it rather important to consider the potential implications of this switch in storytelling and conversation that has occurred over the last 15 years.
I have a two-month-old son, who will almost certainly grow up in a world that leans heavily towards the virtual experience, as opposed to the analog one. Again, I am neither naive nor ungrateful for this; In many ways we are fortunate for the new norms of FaceTime and video messaging. We won’t have to pay for an international calling card to talk to my groomsman who lives in England, or my extended family in South Africa, like my mom did when she moved across the world in 1991 to America. While my son certainly won’t remember these calls, almost every evening we FaceTime one, if not all, his grandparents. We frequently get calls from his aunts, uncles, cousin, and friends, just to see him and rejoice in his being here. These are precious moments of smiles and laughter, and I love them. I’m happy to know that he will always be able to see someone’s face come alive on a screen for him, whether they live down the street or across the world. And I don’t want to downplay the magic of this reality; how wonderful it will be for him should he grow up far away from family or friends. Yet at the same time, I wonder whether he won’t miss out on not only the feeling of receiving a letter, be it hand-written or emailed, but also the nostalgia and emotion of reading one years down the line. What will he remember of the many calls he received? Will he remember the stories that his grandparents tell him, the ones that are so trivial at the time but so meaningful in 15 years? Will he be able to recognize the handwriting of his grandparents one day, picturing them sitting down to write to him, their grandson, out of love? Will he be reminded in his old age of their love for him when he opens that box of letters he has kept for so long?
I am amid an enormous career shift, leaving my job in education after a decade to pursue a business idea I’ve been dreaming of for years. While exciting, the reality of beginning a business has hit hard, and there are often days where doubt creeps in. Will this work the way I think it can? Have I made a giant mistake leaving my stable job at a great school right when we welcomed our first child into the world? Am I capable of seeing this through and providing for my wife and son in ways that I feel responsible to do? These are undoubtedly heavy questions and real concerns, but because my grandmother sat down to write my 18-year-old self a letter 15 years ago this Christmas, my 33-year-old self was given a wonderful reminder when I needed it: that I had (and still have through this letter) a grandmother who loved me unconditionally and who believed in me. She most certainly would have thought my business was the most brilliant, fool-proof idea that would of course be impactful and financially sustainable. She would have bragged about me to her friends, likely making me sound far more impressive than I truly am. For in her mind, there was no way I could fail, and if I did, the failure couldn’t possibly be my fault. She spoke that blind, beautiful confidence into all her grandchildren, and in a silly way, her belief still gives me confidence in myself, even now, years since her passing.
Isn’t it interesting that God also uses written words for us to come back to again and again, in the form of the Bible? We have letters, poems and stories written down to remind us of the reality of the wilderness, the truth of the “already and the not yet”, and the beauty of the resurrection—to call us back to our identity as children of God, loved and known. We are forgetful folks, after all, and while hearing a story once can captivate us, we need something concrete to come back to, just like the Bible. Not only do we need it to come back to, but we also gain new interpretations of Scripture as we grow older, as it meets us where we need it to meet us at different stages of our life. We get to go back to the words when we feel lost, or when we forget what he promises, or perhaps more aptly when we’ve gotten so distracted by the barrage of notifications that simply lose touch with the habit of reading Scripture. And while God doesn’t only work through reading Scripture, sometimes when we move forward in our current day and age with spiritual practices that don’t include Scripture, we lose something core to what it means to be a Christian. Just like we lose something core to memory when we replace letters with phone calls and FaceTimes.
This is not a plea to abandon FaceTime or phone calls, but a call to add back writing letters and emails to our communicative rhythms and habits. It is a “both and”, not an “either or”. So today, maybe write a letter to someone. It doesn’t need to be earth-shattering, well-written, or even grammatically correct. Gaggi’s email to me had numerous spelling and grammatical errors, but those errors make it even more special. It wasn’t carefully curated; it was just written, from Grandmother to Grandson, some 15,600 miles apart. So take the pressure off of yourself to pen the perfect letter and simply share with someone what’s going on in your life, and be curious about theirs. Who knows, you might even get a letter back. Whether you do or do not, you can’t possibly know how your small act of care might impact someone now, or 15 years down the line.
