This week our guest writer is Beth Bingham, letter writer extraordinaire and co-founder of Wink, a line of letterpress products, embellished with the lighthearted charm of a simple line drawing.
Welcome to Together Apart, a community effort to establish mindfulness, connection, and presence, even when we cannot be physically together. Each week we will feature guest writers from various careers, places, and moments in life to discuss how they are Living More in the time of COVID-19.
Today at breakfast I asked, "Is it week three or week four?" They all seem to run together, although one way of telling the time these days is from our collective hairstyles: longer, greyer, mangier. The good news is it is still cold here in Vermont, and we can still wear hats, sorry southerners!
The days fill up: cooking, a bit of cleaning, movie watching, puzzling, dreaming of warmer days. Daily our family gathers for dinner where we share the latest news, decide what movie to watch, talk about work.
Last night’s dinner conversation was about letter writing. I challenged everyone to write one note a week. It doesn’t matter to whom: a family, a friend, a work colleague, simply jot down a thought, a joke, a fact. Then seal it, stamp it, and walk it to the mailbox.
The importance of writing history down is immeasurable, and our individual accounts of our current times will prove useful in the decades to come. Letters are snapshots of our ordinary lives. Sure you can send an email, text or Snapchat. You can TikTok, post on Instagram or tweet, but in the years to come, it is the letters found in the back of a drawer or yellowed in a shoebox that will tell our story.
“Diaries and correspondences are a gold standard,” said Jane Kamensky, a professor of American History at Harvard University and the faculty director of the Schlesinger Library at the Radcliffe Institute. “They’re among the best evidence we have of people’s inner worlds.”
As the co-owner of wink, there are plenty of note cards in our house. Now a basket sits on the kitchen counter with a pile of cards, envelopes, pens, stamps at the ready to document history, bring a smile to a friend, an encouraging word to a healthcare worker, a joke to a grandparent. Not only do these notes document our history, they offer gratitude, kindness, and love. They bring you closer to those you cannot be with.
Let’s commit to putting more ink on paper and send someone a handwritten note. It is a gift for now and a gift for the future.
Check out the @textless_livemore and @awinkdesign Instagram pages next week to participate in a letterpress stationery giveaway!
