Jami: The Postcard Project
Snail mail is alive and well at our house. My husband, Vern, and I met online years ago, so I’m quite fond of the digital age. However, no electronic form of communication has the same thrill as a piece of physical mail dropping through the mail slot.
It’s always been nice to receive occasional snail mail, but due to The Postcard Project, we now get more personal correspondence than bills. I call that a huge life improvement!
The Postcard Project began just over two years ago, thanks to a rekindled friendship. I was inspired by my refound friend’s weekly postcards to the President and daily postcards to a friend – and she had been inspired by another person’s experience. Someone started a chain reaction that is still going.
Vern and I decided to begin our own project, and to keep it personal rather than political. We chose our recipients, gathered up postcards, bought plenty of stamps, and sent out our first mailings in July 2014.
Our goals were to:
Reconnect and stay in touch with people important to us
Throw something good out into the universe
Do something nice for elderly loved ones living alone
Have a joint writing project and hobby
Support the USPS
Once The Postcard Project was in full swing, things snowballed. People who rarely got around to a phone call were suddenly connecting on a regular basis through the mail. And the momentum hasn’t slowed.
Over the past 2+ years, we’ve mailed weekly postcards to various friends and family members in Arizona, Colorado, Oklahoma, Minnesota, New Mexico, Virginia, South Dakota, Washington, and Singapore. In return, we’ve received many hundreds of pieces of snail mail from 3 foreign countries, 10 states, and 30+ cities.
Our dogs aren’t the only ones excited to see the mail carrier every day!
All our goals have been achieved. What we didn’t expect was how much fun we would have and how much our choice of postcards would lead us to researching writers, poets, artists, scientists, musicians, movies, animals, plants, food, weird holidays, historical events, etc. The Postcard Project has morphed into an autodidact’s heaven!
But it’s also been a true gratitude project for everyone connected to it, including us.
Besides sharing our thankfulness with friends and family every week, Vern and I give each other at least one postcard daily. It’s an ongoing exercise in what it means to be present for each other.
Who knew a few measly postcards could do so much?