I cringe when I see the price of Christmas cards and postage combined. Here we are in this technological age, emailing every day to people and instead of a heartfelt Merry Christmas, we invest in cards and stamps and (often) hurriedly write out a message and rush to the post office. Does that make any sense?
My card list has become shorter every year. Cards go to people far away (like Kennebunk or Milbridge) and to people who don’t have e-mail. Still, that guilty feeling persists. I remember my mother with a couple of boxes of cards and her “list” and how she would always take time to write a personal message on each card. But common-sense-advocate that she was, she’d no doubt pick right up on the economy of e-mail and the list would be long gone, if she were here today.
Young people never believe that they will ever lose touch with some of their best friends, but it happens to everyone. Everyone. (No, you will not be different.) The people I’d like best to send/receive a card to or from, are those whose lives were tangled with mine from about the age 19 through 25 or so. During this part of my life, my best friends were in Boston, New York City and lots of places in between. Where are they today? Of the old gang, some have passed away, some have totally disappeared – not even to be found on the Internet, and I have tried. One old friend, formerly a trombonist, is now the head of an Islamic study center in Texas. Others are well known musicians, albeit a little gray around the edges. Good music is ageless. Many became teachers and politicians.
Two of my best, best friends still live in Massachusetts. Both became extraordinary teachers and both have retired, become grandmothers and great grandmothers. We don’t even bother with cards, we have annual phone calls. We always have too much catching up to do, to bother with e-mail. Laughter never comes through well via e-mail, anyway.
As old friends, we share common memories like Kennedy’s assassination, when we all were in one living room in a multi-story apartment building on Symphony Road in Boston. We recall mutual friends who joined the Peace Corps, who helped register southern blacks to vote, who were Freedom Riders. And, of course, we compare our younger days to what young people are up to today. Are they as involved with the politics of today as we were? Do they speak out? Do they love their lives the way they are, or do they feel a restless urge to make things better? I often wonder.
Instead of Christmas cards, Christmas letters would be a better way to communicate with far-away friends, but when summed up, 2005 wasn’t nearly as exciting as 1965. In retrospect, I’m sometimes amazed we’re still here!
Perhaps I will send a few cards to these old friends. Or I can simply dial a number, and not even have to identify myself, and continue a conversation that began so long ago.
Send questions/comments to the editors.
