Loose Leaf Star Date
(Photo: Colleen at the control panel) I was once a prolific letter writer. I suspect that many bloggers were. As someone from a large family, who lives in a different state from most of my family members, my letter writing skills came in handy. When xeroxed Christmas letter became popular, I jumped on the bandwagon, and because I don’t enjoy long conversations by phone, I was soon sending out seasonal mass mailings.
Blogging is a lot like letter writing. I was bound to be a convert. But the transition from pen to keyboard didn’t come easy, and I still can’t get some of my family members online. I still use a pen to sketch out hand-written drafts, as if my mind did its thinking through my hand.
I’ve always been fascinated with how much history has been revealed through personal letters and journals. I treasure my own (my dad’s, really) tattered box filled with the priceless yellowed documents that give me insight into the past…the time, the place, and the character of family members who came before me.
Even fiction stories are sometimes told around personal journals. The movie “Dances with Wolves” revolved around the journal entries of Kevin Costner’s character. And if Captain Kirk hadn’t kept a journal, how would we have known about the adventures of the Star Trek Enterprise?
I consider my blog to be a time capsule of my recent life, and I plan to print out and bind a collection of entries for my descendents. It may not be as personal or stylishly classic as letters are, but at least it will tell my story (and spare them the struggle of reading my handwriting, which has deteriorated over the years to the point of being barely legible).
Loose Leaf and the Palomino camper are off for a new adventure (Where no man has been before? Probably not.). My husband and I are heading out for Colorado to attend his brother’s wedding. I plan to beam-up my blog entries whenever possible, but if my updates and comments in the blogsphere are erratic, you’ll understand why. OK SCOTTY, I’M READY.
Post Note: The commentary I posted last week, “AKA Spending His Way Out of the Doghouse,” which was about President Bush’s responsibility in being unprepared for Katrina due to his downgrading of FEMA, got picked up by “Just Response” and can be viewed here. “Katrina KOs GOP fiscal policies” by Jason Leopold, also on “Just Response” and on the same subject is also worth checking out.
September 23rd, 2005 10:01 am
Have fun in Colorado.
Kind of here from Michele’s.
UHm…teehee…”Live long and prosper.”
September 23rd, 2005 10:05 am
Hi Michele sent me! I SO identified with your post. What a great idea to print out some posts – I think I might do the same and put them in my scrapbooks.
September 23rd, 2005 11:01 am
Colleen,
I enjoyed your words about letters. I too used to be a prolific letter writer–and I am STILL a prolific letter reader. I love reading handwritten letters, whether they are addressed to me or not. And if a book is written in letter or journal format, I will usually buy it or read it with no hesitation. With all the joy that I get from letters, you would think that I would write them more often!
Linda
September 23rd, 2005 12:20 pm
I love the idea of printing out your posts and binding them together. I am going to have to start doing this.
I hope you have a wonderful time in Colorado.
Keep us posted 🙂
September 23rd, 2005 3:17 pm
At the suggestion of my husband, I have been periodically printing my blog posts and putting them in a 3-ring binder. They will be passed to my children and grandchildren, who do not read them on-line (at least they say they don’t!)
Have great fun in Colorado and let us know all about it when you can.
September 24th, 2005 12:29 am
Yes, I kind of think of my blogging buddies as penpals. I’ve had three real penpals in my life, the kind you are randomly assigned, and I have to say that blogging is a lot more fulfilling. Much faster.
September 24th, 2005 11:17 am
Have a great time. Thanks for letting us know your posting may be somewhat erratic
September 24th, 2005 4:23 pm
I too love letter writing. It is a bit of a lost art. Safe and wonderful travels to my home state!
September 25th, 2005 2:46 am
Safe journeys! I’m a longtime fan of old letters and journals. Didn’t start doing annual letters until Mary and I got together, but they’ve since become quite involved.
September 25th, 2005 6:52 pm
I used to write a lot of letters too, I miss having them since the advent of emails. I do print out emails to save once in a while, but they are not the same.
I think keeping blog entries is a good idea.
Also, I’ve been meaning to email you to tell you I’m halfway done with “I love everybody” so I can mail it to you when I’m done if you still want it.
September 25th, 2005 10:07 pm
Printing out, that’s an interesting time capsule. which reminds me that I should print out some of the digital photos I’ve taken where they can be literally passed along.
Happy travels…
September 26th, 2005 6:07 pm
Hope you’re having a blast on your vacation!
Oh yes… I just recently had a conversation about this with my sister in NYC. She said, “Ca, you used to be so wonderful about writing letters, what happened?”
I told her straight out, “My handwriting happened.”
It’s sad but true. And I was once quite proud of my handwriting too!
Back when my oldest sister was in the convent (centuries ago), I was the ONLY family member who would write to her week after week. I was only seven years old. My mom thought it was so cute that I’d sit and write these long winded accounts of all of our goings on.
As years moved on, the keyboard is now my best buddy!
November 7th, 2013 12:05 am
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