Analogue thinking

When I was 13, I had 26 penpals.  Most of them were around my age.  Some were embarrassingly local, like my schoolfriend Teresa, who lived around the corner from my house.  Others were local-ish, like Mandie, a friend made during a family trip to Norwich.  The rest were further-flung; introduced via an ‘international penpal network’.  You registered by post, ticked some favourite countries on a list, and then the network would put you in touch with a kid who lived in each country (kids who, importantly, had also registered for the penpal network).

I mention this merely to illustrate that I’m no stranger to a piece of paper and a pen.

I can’t imagine handwriting that much these days.  26 penpals meant I was always off to the post office for yet more stamps, always retrieving little piles of Air Mail-marked envelopes from the doormat, spending my pocket money on stationery.  How I fit my homework, or my real friends, around this letter-writing maelstrom is a complete mystery!  I sent other things with my letters, too: magazines, mixtapes, trinkets, the lot.  (These gifts garnered different reactions.  I lost Erin, my Nirvana-mad Canadian penpal, after I sent her a pop-based mixtape that included Abigail’s version of Smells Like Teen Spirit).

Yet as I prepare my new email course, Write Who You Are, I’m wondering if I shouldn’t dust off the pen and paper. 

The course encourages handwriting, because it’s better than typing, in myriad ways that affect both your brain and your sense of self.  And since I’m encouraging my course-ees to write using their own hands, should I not do the same?

(Oh, the infernal effort!).

At least two people I know have experimented with sending their newsletters in analogue form; i.e. written out and posted.  One, the brilliantly creative Steve Chapman, has also started sending his podcast episodes on cassettes.  These projects are wistful reminders of how much of our time was – unconsciously, really – spent on Doing a Thing.  Typing a letter takes time and effort, but writing a letter by hand, then physically posting it, takes a lot more of both.  Because of this, handwritten words can feel like they must mean more; maybe more than they would have done when everyone wrote letters.

(Is this why people insist on sending those terrible cards from Moonpig and the like, with the printed personal greetings?  As in: I’m only saying, happy birthday, have a lovely day, so I may as well type that in and have the card sent without me even touching it?

If it is, and you’re guilty of that sort of behaviour yourself, stop now.  Choose a card and write in it yourself, you lazy oaf!).

The upshot of all this is, I might prepare an analogue course option that means sending each week’s instructions through the post, rather than by email.

There will be considerations.  People might not want me knowing their home addresses, and I’d probably have to charge a little bit extra for postage and paper.  Delivery delays (especially around Christmas!) may mean some won’t receive the instructions when I intended them to.  Envelopes might get lost in piles of unexciting, unread bills.

I’m still keen on the idea, though.

There’s something quaint and cosy about the idea of waiting for the post to arrive; of expecting a letter, getting it, then stealing away to a quiet place so you can read it properly.  And since my course-ees won’t have to send anything back to me, the only effort they’ll need to make is reading from a piece of paper, instead of a screen.

(As well as actually doing the assignments, of course).

I’m still developing Write Who You Are.  If you’d like to be among the first to take this course – whether you prefer email or post! – click the envelope in the top-right hand corner of this page, let me know, and I’ll add you to my list.