The Value Of Personal Letters - The Grammar-Us Blog - Grammar-Us

As I write this, my last blog post for the year (I’ll be back in January with new tips and tricks), it occurs to me that there is one type of writing for which I am willing to at least partially suspend the rules of good grammar, spelling and punctuation, based on the premise that ANY communication is better than no communication at all. That is the personal letter.

Having said that, though, I STILL think that you should do your best to communicate clearly, concisely and with the best possible attempt at sounding as if you did not sleep through every English class. This is especially true when writing to your parents. (After all, your parents no doubt paid for your education, and you wouldn’t want them to think they wasted their money!) But to me, it’s far more important to KEEP IN TOUCH than it is to worry about “rules” when loved ones are involved.

I chose to write about the topic of personal letters at this particular time of the year, because it seems that the holiday season may well be the only time that some people actually write personal messages to loved ones. These typically take the form of a short note jotted on the back of a Christmas card, or those ubiquitous “family letters” that catch the recipient up on an entire year’s worth of news. However short or long the message might be, a personal letter is very nearly a dinosaur in this world of emails, text messages, Twitter and Facebook. But it’s a dinosaur that deserves to be saved from extinction, and here’s why:

I have always looked forward to the arrival of the mail truck at my house. Until recently, I could not, for the life of me, figure out why that is, especially since the mail rarely brings me anything good these days – unless you consider mounds of junk mail and bills to be “good.” Then, an event happened that revealed the genesis of my “mail fetish.” A relative shared with me some letters written by my grandfather to his family, while he was serving with the U.S. Army during World War II.

Reading those letters reminded me of my childhood, when both of my grandparents were still alive. A highlight of the week would be when our mailbox contained a letter from them, usually addressed in my grandmother’s distinctive handwriting. One of my most treasured memories is when we gathered together as a family, and either my mother read the missives aloud to us, or the letters were passed to us for our own individual, silent reading. Suddenly, the 1,000 miles between us melted away, and I immersed myself in several pages of news handwritten by my grandmother, as well as a page or two typewritten by my grandfather. I looked forward to receiving these letters!

There was rarely, if ever, any earth-shattering news in the letters. That was not what made them important. What I treasured was the sense of connection that they gave me. Reading about how many jars of pickles my grandmother made may seem mundane, but for me, it evoked memories of the times we travelled to my grandparents’ house for vacations, my trips down to their basement to marvel at the rows and rows of jellies, jams and pickles, all prepared by her, and the boxes full of the goodies that we brought home and savored for months afterwards.

Even more importantly, the letters reassured me that, despite the many miles that separated us, my grandparents truly CARED about us! They cared enough to sit down every week with pen and paper and spend time sharing their lives. They cared enough to buy the stationery and stamps and make a trip to the post office. They cared enough to ask about our activities and to remember us on special occasions. There was love in those letters, and that is priceless!

I still have some of those letters. Unlike today’s electronic communications, these endure. I no longer have email messages or texts that were sent to me last month, but I DO have letters that are now decades old and that can evoke memories even now. I can bring my long-deceased grandparents back to life any time I please, by simply pulling out one of these letters and reading it.

This holiday season, I encourage you to consider writing personal letters to those you hold dear. I can pretty much guarantee you that the gift of your time spent in writing them will be far more treasured than any other thing they may receive! It doesn’t have to be long; it doesn’t have to be profound.  It just needs to be from the heart and from YOU!

I’m wishing all of my readers the blessings of the season, and I’ll be back in January with regular blog posts to help you communicate more effectively.  Meanwhile, if you have any questions or suggestions for future topics, please feel free to contact me on my Facebook page (www.facebook.com/GGCommunications) or via email at claudia@grammargirl.info.