Postcards

I had a one year long friendship largely sustained by being pen pals, and sending letters back and forth in my late twenties with someone I met via Hinge.

The person said they didn't want to date, but were open to being pen pals. When they mentioned this I don't think they realized they were writing to someone who sends way more post cards than the average person.  Ultimately the friendship ended because I wanted to meet up in person more frequently and the friend wasn't very avaiable.

Yes! We were sending each other letters from the same city! There's no rules over who you can write to, but if you want to get the most bang for your buck postage wise you are probably better off sending letters to someone across the country than to someone in the same city, since postage costs the same within the United States.

I was first exposed to the idea of a pen pal when I was in 3rd grade, and we got to have pen pals with another school located relatively far in Florida. It'd be interesting to know if these traditions exist today.  I don't remember my pen pals name, but I do remember he rode dirt bikes. One of the first letters I sent him had the paper oriented the wrong way, and in his response he was explaining how I should orient the paper.

At some point my interest in writing postcards was rekindled, but the lack of school structure forcing a counterpart to write back changes the dyanmic. I've gone so far as to provide an addressed envelope with postage to a friend only to not receive the post card and it has been 2 years! In other cases when friends receive post cards they don't write back, text back or even mention it.

There's a wide variety of responses though. Sometiems you'll build a pen pal relationship. The longest standing one is with one of my closest friends. People will also reciprocate if you send post cards when you're on a trip they'll have more inspiration to do the same on their trip. It's hard to squeeze writing post cards in on a trip, and depending on the country it can be hard to navigate finding the right postage and infrastruture for sending cards.  For instance, when I went to Italy I accidentally bought private postage stamps from a souvenir shop. After googling them I leanred they could be unreliable, and I was also struggling to find the post box for the private stamps.  Since I was in Rome I solved the problem by heading to the Vatican and buying Vatican stamps instead.

If you buy post cards with the intention of sending them while on your trip, but run out of time there's nothing wrong with sending them when you arrive home.

In hostels I've stayed at I've written post cards to the hostel staff, and to random people sitting nearby. I've then sealedd the envelope, placed the postage on it, and then let them write their address on the card so it can be sent to them.

Once I took part in an excericse where we wrote a letter to ourselves and had it shipped to us later down the line. Although I haven't done it since, I feel like I should send post cards to myself more frequently. Usually after writing something it's hard to remember what you wrote, so it'd be cool to see what you did write, and it'd be a good reminder of your tirp.

Another fun thing to explore would be addressing the letter to myself and letting a stranger write to me. This is risky though, because in some capactiy you are exposing your location, and that feels wrong.

I'd encourage more people to write post cards, because it's a cool way to connect with others.  Having a post card writing party with friends also seems fun. You bring letters, and stamps and have the opportunity for people to write to each other.  There's also no need to wait to travel to send a post card.

If anyone is reading this, and they want a post card let me know and I'd be happy to send you one. This offer stands for now as long as this isn't very popular, and I don't have to write very many post cards to people!