E-mail Lacks Personal Stamp

The Boston Herald

In the nearly 20 years that I have been writing this column, I've received many letters. I wish I could say that I answered every one promptly. Most times it took me a while. Eventually though, I got to almost every letter because each was there on my desk, in plain view, with my name printed or scrawled or typed or underlined in red (not a good sign), the envelope a preview to what was inside.

Over time, I got to recognize people by their handwriting, Helene Jamieson's big looped P's and J's ,and Marie Litchfield's perfect Rhinehart slant,  and Shirley Burrow's small impeccable script ,and Ray Redican's ALL CAPITAL TYPING. And when these letters arrived, it was like a friend at my door. I never sat at my desk and read them hurriedly. I always took them into the family room.

Richard Bens still writes. He uses a blue pen and his penmanship is neat and I know even before I see the return address when a note is from him. Ruth Scrivens, Theresa Morgan, Eva Rocha, Don Baumgartner, Don Hejtmanek - I know every one of their letters from their handwriting alone. I even recognize Coley Joyce's typing. 

But I don't get as much real mail as I used to. I get more e-mail and though e-mail is great, it all looks the same. Same script. Same voice.

I have one e-mail friend whose personality is so big that it comes through the standard type and exclamation marks. But I met her through regular mail when she used to sign her letters "Mrs. Donny Osmond." She was funny then. She's funny now. Her e-mails read like letters.

E-mail has its pluses, of course. It has an immediacy. And an intimacy, too, because it is, after all, just a monologue, a stream-of- thought rambling that you don't censor. You vent and click.  

But e-mail has its drawbacks, too. One click and it's out there. But one click and it's gone.

My father e-mails me. He lives close by. He would never write me a real letter, so his e-mails are a bonus. I print them and save them. But most e-mails I delete.

E-mails keep us in touch with people we wouldn't normally be in touch with. They save us from talking to people we don't want to talk to. And they don't require a stamp.

But they are not like handwritten notes that when you rediscover them tucked into a book you must have been reading when they first came, make your heart ache but in a good way.

I got an e-mail this week, which I assumed was from a man, because it said, FROM: And there were three letters followed by four numbers. If I had looked carefully, I might have figured out that the letters were initials. But because they weren't handwritten and because they didn't arrive on familiar stationery, they didn't stand out.

"In the years of corresponding we've covered many subjects," the e-mail began. Then the writer went on to scold me for not answering a previous e-mail. "Can you even guess how difficult it was for me to confide in you?"

I e-mailed back: "I'm sorry I didn't answer your e-mail, but I didn't get it." Maybe I did. Maybe it came in as an attachment, but I don't download. Maybe I deleted it because I didn't know who it was from. "Who are you?" was what I wanted to say.

It was this e-mail that got me thinking about how the letters on my desk are permanent, ink and paper waiting to be saved. But the ones on the computer are temporary, like words you write on a foggy window that fade with the sun.

She wrote back - and signed her name. It's a name I know well, a name whose handwriting I would recognize, a name whose cards and letters I have saved.

But I didn't know her by her e-mail. And the story she told? I must have clicked it away. Easy come, easy go. That's the nature of e-mail. It has its merits. But it's not permanent and it certainly isn't personal.