Wednesday, Jun. 15, 2005 - 10:08 p.m.
Stuck down to sleep like an envelope filled up with words for you
Do you ever have things that are so precious you can hardly look directly at them? Or something you look forward to so much all you do is keep putting it off so you can keep looking forward to it?One thing I do this for now is the rare event of receiving good, proper, old fashioned, hand-crafted, exciting, novelty post. Even in this era of slim postal pickings, a free biro from Capital One doesn't cut it for me (I have four now and I still don't want their credit card ... although they don't know that I'm just holding on to see how many free pens I can get out of them).
When I was a pup I had approximately a million penpals and then I had a brief boyfriend I used to exchange letters with and never has so much effort been put into every sentence, word letter and even envelope decoration. And then when the replies would arrive and I'd come home to see that boyish scrawl on hall table and I'd be simultaneously revelling in the excitement and trying to supress it. I'd examine the dimensions and try to imagine how many words it contained, how big they were written and how important the contents. I wouldn't let myself properly exhale until I'd found a suitably comfortable spot to sit and take it in, and until I'd read the last word.
I've a nice letter beside me now and I keep occasionally touching it to remind myself I've something good to read again in a while. And trinkets.
Brilliant.