Pen Pals

 I’ve neglected my blog recently. I have been preoccupied with other writing and I feel a little as though I have been cheating on you. I’m sorry. 

Writing a blog is like screaming into the void - you never really know if anyone is listening. I am probably an unusual writer, in that I’m not bothered about whether you are reading this or not. I have a picture of you in my mind but if you’re too busy to read or the title doesn’t grab your attention that’s ok, I understand. I didn’t write it for you anyway. I wrote to get it out of my head.

In the last month, however, what was in my head felt too important. It was too big to just scream into the void. So I sent an e-mail, explaining that I would be writing on a weekly basis. Unexpectedly, I got a reply and so I got myself a pen pal.

Wiki has a helpful guide on pen pal letter writing

Letter writing has always been a favourite pastime for me. As a child I had pen pals, wrote to the radio (under aliases) and large companies (it was a bonus to discover that you’d get sent two packs of Smarties if you wrote of your disappointment at not getting any orange ones - because orange smarties are obviously the best, even though you can make lipstick with the red ones.) 

I think it started with my dad, who would write a letter a day when he went on training courses. I remember writing my first letters back when I was about 3 and I’m certain they were no more than squiggles.  There was something special about writing to someone who was far away. I went on the school German exchange trip and managed to write enough letters before to feel we really knew each other. We continued to write for a few years, long enough so that I can still recite her address including postcode.  When I went to University you had to queue for the phone box and so I remained an avid letter writer.  Now, I only write an occasional e-mail, which is faster and probably easier to read as my handwriting has always been appalling but I do miss the actual stationary. Every Christmas Santa brought me a large pad of Basildon Bond and some envelopes and then in 1988, when my letter writing went into overdrive the first Paperchase store appeared in London and I would buy beautiful coloured writing paper and matching but lighter  or darker ink for my fountain pen. 

What I really like about letter writing is the distance it creates. You can pretend to be friendly without having to get too close. You can just not say things that you don’t want to say and no one can see you roll your eyes. 

Unfortunately, my latest pen pal decided that they’d like to meet. It wasn’t what I’d planned. I knew that there would be too many opportunities for eye rolling. If you ever find yourself in this position then I recommend meeting your pen pal with a brilliant person who can do the talking, while you smile and give yourself a headache trying to keep your eyes fixed in position. 

I would like to think that having this pen pal has helped a little and that the brilliant person didn’t mind but I’m thinking that I’m going to go back to screaming into the void, which means that you’ve got me back. Sorry.