I’ve been finding letters.
Long lost letters.
Long saved letters.
Long ago, written-by-hand letters.
As and Es and Is strung together to form laughter and love and pain.
Through my veins runs remorse
then retraction
as I read the letters aloud.
Loopy script
Straight uppercase caps
Bubbled Oooos and lowercase bees
All of them stamps of time and postmarks of personality
Who knew then that you were a poet, dear Friend?
Who knew that you could dance with your words, dear Lover?
Who knew, Mother, that you missed me with an ache you hid away so I would never know
until I, too, was a mother?
Aching…
Who knew then
what I know now?
Did you?
And I simply
missed it?
Did you know I would read your words aloud
and fall in love with a version of you I never knew?
and yadda yadda, an aliyah blog 
Correct, that. The script tells its own part of the story.
I have a box of saved letters from my departed Dad. Scared to read them, since lately I seem to do anything possible to avoid strong feelings. Oh well, they’ll be there when I heal, barring silverfish.
Sweet to see you discover things about your mother.
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I mailed an inked letter just the other day. There are some feelings that aren’t meant for an email or word processor.
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Amen.
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I found a letter from some great great grandfather or something, describing the funeral oif Queen Victoria, and that was amazing. An email would have been nothing like the same thing
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You gave me shivers. I love this post, especially the conclusions and questions you come to at the end. I also love letters, and have two huge boxes of them downstairs; letters my great aunt received and kept during her 97 years and letters and cards I’ve received over the years.
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Beautiful. I save letters and also birthday cards. One of my favorite was from my grandmother (who survived the Holocaust) who said “Happy birthday. people should be kind to you. You can achieve this with your own personality.”
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