Guest writer Rebecca Hutchings on why she writes letters in the digital age
Psychology Today’s Dr. Klemm states that writing by hand is much more beneficial to our dexterity and fine motor skills than single strokes on a keyboard
Most people would agree that these days letter writing is rather a dying skill. Yet I remember in my school days writing innumerable letters. Formal and informal. To friends both real and imagined. Letters about trips never taken. Thank yous for gifts never received. Applications for jobs that didn’t exist. Reservations for hotels never to be built. Letters in English, Welsh and French. All in our best hand. All signed. All set out in the rigid but so comforting format. We spent an inordinate amount of time on a skill that many would argue is now obsolete.
It was many years after this before I would pick up a pen for anything other than to scribble a quick recipe or prep list. It was time to leave my job. Onwards and upwards, pastures new etc. Of course this calls for one of the few letters still in circulation: the letter of resignation. I was to write mine by hand and, too proud to just use a sheet of A4, a trip to the stationers was in order.
I have always found great beauty in paper. Colourful paintings. Cherished photographs. The smell of a favourite book. The glorious pure beauty of a blank page, ready to be filled with your own pictures and words. To leave a page blank is to do it a great disservice. Of course I was now in the presence of many more blank writing pages than I could possibly spend on my resignation. It was time to become an accidental letter writer. There was of course only one potential correspondent.
My grandmother is certainly not an accidental letter writer. She is the only person I know who has avidly rejected technology. No smartphone. No laptop. No Facebook. No Instagram. This is a lady who still goes into the bank to withdraw cash. No contactless. Not even a cashpoint. My grandmother has no means of communicating electronically and even if she did, it would pale for her in comparison to the beauty of a letter.
My grandmother is my pen pal and just typing that gives me a tremendous sense of warmth. Call me sentimental (and I am) but letter writing is a very cosy and peaceful hobby. Electronic communication is so busy and hurried and noisy. Photos are instantly uploaded to hundreds of people. Likes pour in like so much instant validation. All the updates. The messages. All the beeps, the pings, the rings noisily jostling for attention. Me me me! Now now now! They scream and for the most part we respond, our phones never away from our sides.
A letter on the other hand falls on to your doormat with barely a whisper. Patiently it waits for you to come home. The news it tells you is soft and unobtrusive. It will speak of happy holidays, mutual friends and family members, excitedly anticipated future plans. The letter demands no immediate response. Rather it encourages and inspires. It invites you to look at your life and wonder what you will share. The way spring is slow to come this year. What a nice dinner you enjoyed last night. The new recipe you are working on. The course you are studying. You can take time to sit at your desk in silence and transcribe this particular period of your life onto a blank page. A letter then becomes more than a means of communication. It becomes a unique, tangible object. A thing of peace and beauty.
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