Year-End Stats

First of all, let me get this off my chest. Mexico is decidedly not the country to go to get postcards. What precious few I could find were faded, curled, sandy, and cost more than a taco. I bought them anyway, though they did not substantially add to my collection. (It costs less to buy a set of 20 Mark Rothko postcards at a MUSEUM than to pick up seven dirty nasty ones in a village near Puerto Vallarta.)

Not that this forbodes anything. While the end of December showed a sharp decline in my sending and receiving, I plan to spend 2013 trying to beat my 2012 record.

Now for the stats. Through the U.S. postal service:

• I sent 200 postcards in 2012 and received 120.
• I wrote more than 90 cards and letters and received at least 68 in return.
• I didn't send a single Christmas card and my loved ones didn't hold it against me: I still got 20 holiday cards.

Not even counting the few packages that were shipped and received, this amounts to more than $182.50 in the Postal Service's coffers. Actually, it's way more, since many of you are not nearly as thrifty as I am, and put 45-cent stamps on postcards plus double or triple the number of stamps needed on a letter. Good job.

We did well, my friends. Let's continue the trend and make it a hobby in 2013!

The Meta Postcard Experience

In my year-long experiment with mini-correspondence, I had the most meta of meta-experiences the other day. I opened my mailbox to find a photocopy of a postcard sent to somebody else. Understanding the significance of my recent singledom after years of serial monogamy, the original recipient felt compelled to send it to me. Here's what it said:

she liked imaginary men best of all

It made me laugh deep and hard. Then I read the note. My friend and I have long agreed that men and women would get along better if they didn't co-habitate. The original sender of this clever card is happily married to a man who lives in an apartment in the building next door to her.

Two messages in one; two validations; two reminders that it's okay to be different - to try and fail - to never stop trying to invent a new way, an alternative path to happiness. 

Things You Weren't Supposed to Read

Last century, when I was in college at San Francisco State, I fell in love with a boy who was in love with someone else. Though he was moving to England to be with her, it didn't stop him from falling in love with me before the semester ended. We said good-bye in tears as I boarded a plane for Germany, determined as I was to beat him out of the country.

Three months later, back in San Francisco, I received a package from my mother: a large manila envelope stuffed with 24 fat letters, each one addressed to me and postmarked from a small village in England.

The gist: he loved me, not her, she was insecure and needy, he had to get out of there, he was flying to Florida, meet him in Orlando, move to the Caribbean, work on sailboats, bask in the glory and splendor of our love.

Based on three weeks and 24 letters, I packed up my life and moved 3,700 miles from home, never asking myself what he told the English girl, or how she might have felt had she read those letters. It never even occurred to me.

Half a year after that, our relationship as worn and crusty as a derelict boat, I picked up this notepad of his that was always laying around. For the first time in my life, I read something I wasn't supposed to read.

It was addictive.

Especially when it turned out to be letters to the girl in England. And now it was me he no longer loved.

Back in San Francisco, I moved into a flat with two roommates. In no time, I was reading their letters, their journals, anything I could get my hands on when they weren't around. I learned in the pages of their flowery diaries what they thought about each other. Even more sickly satisfying: what they thought about me. In person, Jen said, "How cool!" as I walked out the door wearing a fedora to a Humphrey Bogart retrospective at the Castro. In her journal, she mocked me with mean little jabs. Vividly I remember the knotty pit in my gut as I read it.

It hurt, but I kind of liked it. It felt wrong the same way I imagined shoplifting felt wrong to Winona Ryder. A thrill it was, like jumping out of an airplane, freefalling into private thoughts as I listened for the key in the lock. It was deliciously toxic, that mix of good and terrible. I craved it like a smoker for a cigarette.

When I moved out, I quit, cold turkey, never again. In that year of living dangerously, I learned suspicion is not your friend. If someone doesn't have the guts to tell you their truth, then you have to trust your gut. It's the best evidence you'll ever have, and no written words will ever prove better than what you feel and carry inside you.

The Original Snoop Dog's Love Letters

I heard a great story about Charles Schulz on "Morning Edition." In the 1970's, when his marriage was deteriorating and he hadn't yet met his second wife, the creator of Peanuts courted a young woman named Tracey.

He sent 44 letters and 35 drawings to Tracey over an eight-month period. Most of the letters were brief; in the drawings, Schulz let his alter-ego Charlie Brown stand in for him to deliver the bittersweet messages of love. In the report, a manuscript specialist described how unsatisfied Schulz felt during that time in his life. The collection, then, reflects - however briefly - the way correspondence can sweetly fill a void.

In my youth, Snoopy was a great love of mine - that wacky little dog who dreamed of being an author. One of the illustrations Tracey received was an excerpt from Snoopy's novel. "It was a dark and stormy night," it began, accompanied by a cover note: "Who else do you know that gets a manuscript from a dog?"

Does anyone have an extra quarter of a mil I could borrow? The auction starts on Friday, and I can't quite come up with the opening bid.

Click to read (or listen to) the whole story on NPR

Letter from a Dog

The other day, I received a piece of correspondence in a legal sized "envelope," really a piece of construction paper folded and taped with packing tape, addressed in crayon in the writing of a child. No return address. Curiouser and curiouser.

I had to cut it open with a knife, and inside was an unsigned, typewritten letter. I knew instantly who'd written it, because the author referred to my dog, Bill, as "Sir William of the White Lawns" and I know only one person who does that. The letter informed me that my dog had learned to use a computer, and written the story of his life. "He doesn't type well because his paws are too wide, and his nails (he refers to them as his "claws") get in the way."

I share the the text of that letter here, unedited. It is relevant to the story how feebly I hail Bill when he's run off into the woods behind my house. I clap twice and say "Bill, come here." He rarely, if ever, complies. You might need to have a 9-year career reading the writing of students with disabilities to decode this letter, but if you try hard enough, you will surely laugh from the belly, until tears come out of your eyes. Or maybe you won't. Maybe you have to know Sir William of the White Lawns personally to get it. Do let me know.

                                            my life asd clapc lapb illec om ehere.

My bnanme isz c lapclap b iloycomkehere. I found a person dwebrqa wjhere I livgfed wjhen I wazs b orn. I saw debrqa and tolldx her I was her dovgv. My name was boy when I was boern and debr4qa named mje c lap clap bill c omehere. Mty sjort name is nobil.

Ilove debra.she lovews me. we libve in a gungle but she doesn't go in there sdhe like her box kmore than to live in a gun gle. She wsmells so good. She put hot wqatfe3rf on me and made me smell baed.i still smell bnad and feel baed. Ican get under the3 couch next time. When I had anotnhner houjse I hade to go to I would poop in teh carf. Inever poop in debrazcar I lovedd debra and debrqa lovfedsmed. I dont let people hurt debrfa. She hqas monsterrfsz that are afdrid of me.thwey come in and hide evedrywhere wjhen ewee go outrsdide but ialways find them rmonsters rhright awazy and mazke them diee. The enf. Clsapclapbiklcomhere.

This regal animal is literate, too.

The Xmas Letter

My mom is the expert at Xmas letter writing. She's not one of those people who shrinks the font and expands the margins so she can fit every last detail of all 365 days on both sides of the candy-cane bordered quality paper from Office Max. No. She is brief. She is chipper. And she does that thing that everyone seems to do - she brags about her kid. I am 46 and haven't lived at home in 27 years but my antics are still prominently featured and yeah, I kind of love it.

Recently, my mom attended an Xmas Letter Writing Workshop. Yes, there is someone out there teaching people how to do it (and it isn't my master mom). My secret fantasy is that this teacher concentrates on brevity and the limits of braggadocio. "Cut it by 75%" she says in a commanding voice to gasps of horror across the room. I admit, I'm throwing pebbles inside my champagne glass home, having been the guilty writer of more than one overlong, over-boastful Xmas letter. But let's not dwell on my shortcomings...

Back to other people's letters, the senders with the incredibly perfect lives. Their children are in AP Honors classes and winning soccer trophies. They themselves have just purchased their second Mercedes SLS. It's all yang and no yin, all pictures of beaming, beautiful children. You are left to wonder what your old friends, the letter-writers, look like, and you just have to assume they are wrinkly and fat. (Unless they're working out at Crossfit and running the Ironman. Then, you'll see their photos, too.)

Wouldn't you love to get an Xmas letter someday that says, "This year, my husband left me for a man and my kids dropped out of MIT to deal crystal meth"? The only problem with that is, should such a letter ever arrive, it'll conclude: "Everything's worked out fabulously - my husband's lover just redecorated my home and my kids? They're making more money than they ever would have with college degrees so ... they're flying us all to Tahiti! Happy Holidays, Everyone!!!"

I've decided not to send an Xmas letter, and not just because there's been an inordinate amount of yin in my life lately. I usually try to never say never, but I'm not sure I'll ever write another Xmas letter. It just doesn't fit my plans, which are to write, and continue writing postcards and personal correspondence for the rest of my life. Why jumble it all up with a form letter?

If you hear from me this holiday season, it'll be something like you'd get any other day of the year.

However. I still want your Xmas letters, each and every one of them. Especially if your husband's a secret homosexual and your kids successful drug dealers. As Dorothy Parker famously said, "If you don't have anything nice to say, come sit by me."

One Fell Swoop

I had all my hair cut off.

Well. Not all of it, though I was briefly tempted to do a Jamie Lee Curtis, or a G.I. Jane. I did it spontaneously, in anguish, having lost something dear to me that I felt unlikely to ever get back. I didn't donate the hair; it was an act far too impulsive for that. I was just sitting there, crying and crying over this loss, and I wondered What would make me feel better? A full body tattoo. Free-falling out of an airplane. Catching the next overnight flight to Paris. Ah, yes, but what would make me feel better that I can do right this minute?

Armed with four photos hastily grabbed off google images, I drove to the first Great Clips I could find. I sat in the chair of the first available stylist - I think her name was Tiffany. I showed her the pictures: Sheryl Crow with hair the length of mine; Michelle Pfeiffer with hair just below the shoulders; a pre-facelift Meg Ryan just-above-the-shoulders; and Charlize Theron an inch below the chin.

Obviously, I'd been on the fence up till the moment I sat in the chair. "Somewhere between this and this," I blurted, pointing to Meg and Charlize. "So... just above the shoulders?" Tiffany asked. "Yeah, but be careful, 'cause my hair is super heavy, so it will spring right up once you cut it... go longer than you think."

I guess Tiffany didn't hear that part, because I wound up with something more akin to Meg Ryan circa "French Kiss." Clearly, my dangerously high celebrity standards had, once again, backfired.

And yet it's perfect. Tiff got a really fat tip on the $11 cut. (Yeah, I know, right? So much cheaper than a full body tattoo.)

Thus I went from a 14-page double-sided letter about boring ancient history to a postcard from Biarritz in

ONE

FELL

SWOOP

of the scissors.

Staying Open

Maybe you don't know what it's like.

I've entered Month 11 of my postal project and it's a comfortable routine now. I have routine correspondence with a few fellow letter-writers, and I send and receive postcards at regular intervals with many more. I've worked through the wishing that everyone would write back, and let it be okay that most don't.

I kind of feel like this is huge. I live in a world of mandatory reciprocation, a very, very transactional world. I give a clerk money, she bags my purchases. You slide your card in, your gas tank gets filled. Even in nature: I water you, you bloom. I feed you, you return to my garden.

It takes effort of a different kind to give without expecting anything back, and maybe that's the underlying point of my project - to teach myself how. It hasn't just been to fill a basket with postcards from all over, or fill a box with letters. There's more to it - a depth I haven't touched yet - beyond the sending of tangible post.

For now, I'm thinking it's this: take the experience of sending mail without expectation and turn it into a lifetime of openly giving. And then to keep giving, to never stop giving, no matter what.

It'll take some practice.

New Handwriting

I love hearing from the regulars now. It's a thrill to open the box and see familiar handwriting on the backs of postcards and the fronts of envelopes. A stomach-flipping-over joyous rush of yay.

And then there's this different kind of jubilation, a rarer occurrence: new handwriting. A stomach-flip-flop of Who's this from? Glance at the postmark. Be tempted to skip over the writing, straight to the bottom, find the signature ... but No. Read it. See if you can detect the writer through his or her words. Do you hear her voice? Is there something familiar in his message? 

There always is. It's like a Magic Eye picture in words, slowly coming into focus, and if you don't rush to the ending, if you don't spoil the surprise, you figure out who wrote the card before getting to that last line.

And that gives you a kind of thundering roar in the belly, not unlike applause.

(Thanks for the roars, ladies.)

From Sally:
Port Townsend Wooden Boat Festival.

From Sherry:
"The Be Bop Boy and his One Man Band."

So What

Just click on this link and press play and give it a listen.

http://www.beyondtheperf.com/miles-davis-edith-piaf/

Read the beautiful timeline of the paralleling lives of Miles Davis and Edith Piaf. Listen to "So What," that legendary Miles tune, as you peruse this page.

Don't stop till you reach the bottom, where you'll read ... well, here's just a sample - never enough - like a riff of Miles or a refrain of Edith:

"Like music, stamps speak an international language - an idea fully expressed when two nations agree to a joint issue. The U.S. Postal Service and La Poste, the French postal administration, are proud to present two stamps that cross borders, cultures, and generations -- Edith Piaf and Miles Davis."

Then go buy your own damn stamps and send me a letter. (If you can send it to me from France, I'll love you even more.)

Little Gifts

A few weeks ago, at the Mark Rothko opening in our local art museum, I attended a lecture by the curator of modern and contemporary art from the National Gallery in Washington D.C. Harry Cooper spoke eloquently and freely about Rothko's history and evolution, from a young artist experimenting in different styles to the iconic rectangle guy we know today.

He had a slide show and a lot of facts, and an interesting disdain for a particular early Rothko, "Man with Green Face." He mentioned it more than once in an unflattering way.

When the lecture ended, there was the requisite Q and A, and a bunch of poser types had to show off their knowledge of All Things Art, asking incomprehensible questions loaded with jargon. After five or six of these meandering topics leading nowhere, I raised my hand.

"How come you don't like the 'Man with Green Face?'" I asked. I'm proud to say that Harry Cooper was speechless for a moment. Then he chuckled and said, "Well, I don't know, really. Why do you like him?" I chuckled back and said, "I'm not sure I actually like him. I just wondered why you didn't." I paused, and then continued. "Maybe I do kind of like him. He reminds me of Frankenstein, a little." This got some nervous laughter from the posers, and then Harry said, "Well, there you go. I just don't like Frankenstein."

I only mention this because of a series of little gifts I've received lately. My friend Sherry was also at the lecture, and a few days later we met on Main Street for First Thursday.  She had a gift bag for me. In it: a Frankenstein serving tray and cocktail napkins. Then an article out of the Houston Star arrived in the mail from Lu, about a whole movement in Generation Y toward bringing back the lost art of written correspondence. (Picture me, green as the green-faced man with envy of the 25-year-old who's collected about 1,000 postcards and sent more than 800 in two years.)

Just this week, a small box arrived in the mail from Evette. Inside: 10 notecards and 10 Forever Stamps of 20th Century Poets. (Evette likes to think of me as a poet, has always encouraged me as a writer, and I know she must've seen this gift pack and immediately thought of me.)

Oh! And maybe best of all! Evette included a stamp dispenser. One that reminds me of the old-timey stamp dispenser that used to sit on my Mamaw's cedar-smelling sideboard where she kept all her mail and her address book.

(What the hell has someone like me been doing all this time without a stamp dispenser?)

And how did someone like me get so lucky as to have friends like these?

Comics

Strangely, I've become one of those women who cuts comics out of newspapers and magazines and mails them to people.

I always thought this activity was reserved for mothers of adult children and perhaps elderly, doting aunts. 

But no. I see a cartoon strip that reminds me of someone and it's as if I'm driven by a deep, innate instinct beyond my control. I'm a Stepford Wife, I'm on automatic pilot, I'm a zombie marching inevitably to the scissors, the stationery, the envelope, the stamp. Must. Get. In. Mail. A.S.A.P.

Should you receive one of these odd little mailings from me, please don't regard it the same way you think of as junk or spam. Give me your empathy, your appreciation, or at least some pity. I have no children off at college to whom I might send care packages with cute little Dennis the Menaces or Family Circuses tucked neatly between the chocolate chip cookies and banana bread. I'm no maiden aunt, either (the plight of the only child). 

Since I have no one appropriate on whom to pawn this nascent urge, perhaps you can consider yourself - I don't know - lucky? It is personal - I wouldn't send it if it didn't remind me of you. Will it make you feel better if it's from The New Yorker? I'll do my very best. And think of yourself as lovingly chosen to stand in for nieces and nephews everywhere.

Why I LOVE the P.O.

Not surprisingly, about a week after I ran out of mailing labels, I ran out of stamps.

So on this warm, sunny Friday afternoon, I go into my local post office. The line is just four deep, and there are three workers on duty. I am called up within a minute or less by a guy about my age. He has slicked back hair and an air of Vinnie Barbarino about him.

"What can I do for you today?"

"Could I get a roll of --"

"-- We don't have rolls --"

"-- postcard stamps?"

Vinnie smiles broadly. "Oh, sorry! Yes, that we have! How many you want? There's a hundred in a roll, you know."

"Just one."

Vinnie pops a roll onto the counter and says, "Anything else?"

"Yeah. Could I see all the different first class stamps you have?"

At this, I expect some balking, or at least a little drop in Vinnie's enthusiasm.

But no! "Sure!" he says. He slides open a big draw with a bang and starts pulling out sheets of colorful postage. "We got bicycles, we got O. Henry. He's like, like a literary guy... we got cherry blossoms" -- Vinnie looks at me -- "You like cherry blossoms?"

I say, "Yeah, yeah, I like cherry blossoms. I'll take those and the O. Henry and the bicycles. What else you got?"

"We got baseball --"

"--Definitely no baseball for me --"

"--We got the Disney cars --"

"I've had those already, maybe this is enough?"

"We got Miles Davis and Edith Piaf --"

"WHAT?" I exclaim.

Vinnie grins and hands me the Miles and Edith without a word.

Sixty-eight dollars later, I am ready to correspond again.

Mailing Labels - A Cautionary Tale

Unsurprisingly, I have run out of return address labels. The ones I'd been using were a set of Ziggy labels I received four years ago when I gave some money to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. The others were a set of beach scenes that I again got for "free" when I donated to St. Jude's. They have my name annoyingly spelled with a lower case q. Mcqueen is just not the same as McQueen, is it?

It was a bit of a shock when I placed the last ugly beach scene label on an envelope recently. Apparently, the organizations to whom I've been doing my charitable giving stopped offering this service, and I hadn't been paying attention.

I had no choice but to resort to ordering and purchasing return address labels - something I hadn't done in over 20 years.

Back in the day, you'd find ads for these things in coupon mailers and the Lillian Vernon catalogs that my mom received. It was a quick and simple process, with few choices and almost no shipping fees.

Now, of course, there are approximately 5,500,000 companies from whom you can order return address labels over the internet. Just click on, say, the first company in the lineup and you'll find yourself with 8,185 design choices.

A word of advice: don't (as I did) spend two hours late on a Friday night perusing most of the 8,185 designs, only to have your wi-fi bog just when you've made a decision. Wait until morning. Pick something from the first page. IT'S AN ADDRESS LABEL - not a tattoo that will mark you till the end of days. Give yourself ten seconds, pick, click, and don't balk at the $4.50 shipping fee, even though the labels only cost $1.99.

Sigh. Who knew it was possible to miss Lillian Vernon catalogs?

Vintage

I recently received a "letter in postcards" from my friend Laura: 8 vintage postcards, to be exact, numbered and mailed in one fell swoop.

I cannot put into words the joy and delight that filled me upon opening the mailbox to find EIGHT postcards - all at once - from a beloved friend who lives on the opposite end of the continent.

She is 34 weeks pregnant (probably 36 or 37 by the time of this writing), and philosophical about her future as a parent. While I had a brief stage under the influence of my biological clock (tick-tock, tick-tock!), it passed and now I'm basking in the simplicity and splendor of being a GINK (Green Inclinations, No Kids http://www.facebook.com/GINKthink and http://ginkthink.wordpress.com)

So I must confess, most of the time I can no more relate to pregnant women than I can to mothers of young children.

But Laura said something that finally put the whole thing into a perspective to which I can relate. She wrote, "It's kind of like this... When you have a 'BIG TRIP,' you spend months reading guide books, getting essentials, learning about your destination, etc. etc. When you come home, you pretty much go back to life as it was before the trip. Yet for PARENThood, your life is different forever."

It's actually been my experience that the BIG TRIPs never let you go back to life as it was before. So we have that in common. As Angelina Jolie famously said, "A single journey can change the course of a life."

And so I wish you - Laura in particular, future and new mothers in general - Bon voyage! May you have the most splendid of journeys.

Erratum

It turns out I was wrong about London Bridge and the Twelve Apostles (see "Metamorphosis").

They are not, as I so hastily assumed, all one in a continuous state of transience over a 15-year-period.

They are, in fact, two distinct places on Great Ocean Road in Victoria, Australia.

You can see (can't you?) how it happened - I took a couple of looks at the postcard, got my idea of metamorphosis, and ran off half-cocked with it. I didn't even bother with a quick check on Wikipedia.

Which is at least one reason why I'm an unpaid person blogging for her own enjoyment, and not a well paid scientist with the Pew Research Center.

Alas, alas. This too shall pass.

As Mark Twain famously said, "Never let the truth get in the way of a good story."

Metamorphosis

A friend who went to Australia sent me a pretty amazing postcard the other day. One of those images that reaches out and grabs you, that goes beyond depicting a pretty scene or a fun experience. The kind of picture that makes you think deep, philosophical thoughts and drives vivid memories from your past back into the bright foreground of consciousness.

OK, maybe I'm overstating it, but only just a little.

At first glance, it's just four shots of limestone rock formations on the coast of Victoria, Australia. Then... wait a minute... each one is captioned with a different date. 2 July 2005; 3 July 2005; 14 January 1990; and 15 January 1990. While the pictures are all of the "Twelve Apostles" and the "London Bridge," each is very different.

For starters, on January 14, 1990, when the place was still called London Bridge, it was a natural bridge from land to sea. Overnight, the part that connected the bridge to the land was gone. 

Fifteen years later, you can see why they changed the name. Bridge? What bridge? On July 2, 2005 it's simply stacks of rocks: presumably twelve of them, though in the photo you can only see six - and, then, well, just five by sunset July 3.

The ocean and tides had been doing that hard (or do I mean easy?) work of changing the landscape forever.

Which reminded me that in the 1990's, I was living in Santa Cruz, California, trying to be a vegan, dating a boy far too young for me, and frequently visiting a place called Natural Bridges State Beach. In 1990, there was only one mudstone bridge remaining of the original three. Today, there's no bridge at all, and the literature provided by the park service deemphasizes the rock formation and focuses on the main tourist attraction: the eucalyptus forest that forms the temporary home of over 100,000 Monarch butterflies during their annual migration.

If you had told me in 1990 that by 2012 I'd be a divorced, barbecue-loving special education teacher living in the Bible Belt and using the word "y'all" on a daily basis (not to mention everything in between), you know I would have said in my Valley Girl accent, "Yeah, like, right."

This postcard, then, is a literal depiction of how changeable all things are. It's called erosion at the beach, but the word has a negative connotation of destruction. In living things, it's not erosion. For the monarchs, it's called metamorphosis, which has a definition I can live with: a change in the form or nature of a thing or person into a completely different one.

This postcard is a reminder of what I sometimes forget, that ultimate truism: "this too shall pass."

And this is not, by its very nature, a bad thing.

Connection

I've posted here before about my volunteer work through the Amma Foundation's Circle of Love, writing letters to women who are struggling with life's hardships. For the last two months, I've written once a week to two women about whom I know very little. I don't know their ages, their marital status, their race, their education... any of the things we take for granted that we know about people with whom we commune.

It's been an interesting process, and, as it turns out, a spiritual one. At first I focused on getting it right: a familiar scenario, even with friends I know well. When a loved one is diagnosed with cancer, or loses a parent or sibling (or, god forbid, a child) to death, my stomach wobbles and my heart clenches and I don't know what to say. I refuse to resort to platitudes, so I'm instead mute, distant.

It's that much harder when you commit yourself to offering words of support to people you've never met. How to write something meaningful without being preachy; how to acknowledge their struggles without making them think that's all I think they're about; how to share parts of myself and my life without making it too much about me. What is their religion? If I quote Buddha (my favorite philosopher, though I'm not Buddhist), will that be an affront?

Spirituality has long eluded me. I've met lots of people I think of as holy, and they strike me as mystical, meditative, wise, always saying just the right thing, shrouded in light that emanates off them, their bodies surrounded by angelic halos you can practically see. Not being that version of spiritual, I guessed that I simply wasn't at all. 

It occurred to me just this week that maybe my path is on the ground.  It's about connection. While I have never been and am still not quite sure there even is a god or spirit or higher power, I've certainly loved the idea that god or spirit is within each of us and that we are all one. I have moved often, changed jobs frequently, made friends easily, and written, and written, and written. In all these years, most people I meet have been willing to open up. Countless times I've heard people say, "I've never told anyone this before..." People trust me with secrets, and I've always thought this was wholly secular. But maybe not. Maybe the way I connect with people and share bits of my life as they share bits of theirs, the more peaceful and at ease we become together in this material world. 

In any event, I figured this out while writing my Circle of Love letters this week. For a moment, I felt some light emanating off of me. It could've been a hot flash - there's been a disconcerting increase in those lately - but this one, at least, I chose to think of as something slightly more profound.

Abundance

I've been rereading Eckhart Tolle's book A New Earth. It's the third time. I almost never read books more than once, so that tells you something. I think of it as a how-to manual for staying in the present moment, being kind and generous, and spreading good will. It may well be the best book I've ever read.

In the chapter "Finding Who You Truly Are," Eckhart writes about abundance. I was listening to it in my car, and had an Ah-hah! moment.

"Who you think you are is also intimately connected with how you see yourself treated by others," Eckhart writes. "Many people complain that others do not treat them well enough."

Boy, have I walked a few hundred miles in those shoes! When I got home, I pulled my print copy of the book off the shelf found the section where I had the Ah-hah!

Try this for a couple of weeks and see how it changes your reality: Whatever you think people are withholding from you - praise, appreciation, assistance, loving care, and so on - give it to them. You don't have it? Just act as if you had it, and it will come. ... You cannot receive what you don't give. 

Eckhart goes on a few sentences later to say:

See the fullness of life all around you. The warmth of the sun on your skin, the display of magnificent flowers outside a florist's shop, biting into a succulent fruit, or getting soaked in an abundance of water falling from the sky. The fullness of life is there at every step. The acknowledgment of that abundance that is all around you awakens the dormant abundance within. Then let it flow out. When you smile at a stranger, there is already a minute outflow of energy. You become a giver. 

I want to live my life every day like this.

It's shallow, I know, to think of postcards having anything to do with this spiritual quest. But, for me at least, they do.

I'm actually getting plenty of praise, appreciation, assistance, and loving care. My life feels full and rich, and I don't take that for granted.  I've got nothing to fuss about. But - dammit - my mailbox runneth empty. (There are approximately two exceptions. You know who you are.) And I get it. Summer's over. Back to work. No more vacations to Myrtle Beach, to tourist shops, to five postcards for a dollar. But I had been rather enjoying a run of receiving several a week, and now I'm back to redplum.com advertisements and my water bill. Blech.

The only thing missing in my life - what people are "withholding" from me - is postcards!

So, on the advice of Eckhart Tolle, I will give what I'm not getting. I will go through my entire address book and give, and give, and give. I will remind myself, "You cannot receive what you don't give."

Click this link for more on Eckhart Tolle

Postcard Mixtape

I was driving along listening to my MP3 player and here came the good old Talking Heads. I was doing my na-na-na-NA-na thing (I remember song lyrics about as well as I remember phone numbers, but that doesn't stop me from "singing" along). Then came some words I DID know, and I started belting them out:

Why stay in college? Why go to night school?

Gonna be different this time

Can't write a letter, can't send a postcard,

I can't write nothing at all

This ain't no party, this ain't no disco,

this ain't no fooling around

And then it came to me like a message from above… my mission needs a mix tape! (Don't you just picture Javier Bardem in "Eat Pray Love" saying "I made you a meex tape" whenever you hear someone say "mix tape?" Or is that just me? Okay, fine. Call it a soundtrack.)

And here it is. (Something for everyone.) (With commentary.) (Of course.) (And links!)

1. "Another Postcard" Barenaked Ladies (they make postcarding funny!)

2. "Postcard from Paris" The Band Perry (not bad for cute CandW)

3. "Postcard from Italy" Beirut (quavery-voiced lead singer of meaningless lyrics, but great trumpet)

         (if you like Florence and the Machine like I do, this version's better FandTM)

4.  "Postcard" Steven Wilson (a good, whiney fit for a Grey's Anatomy episode about angsty Christina, and none of the lyrics have anything to do with the title, but the animation is cool)

5.  "Postcard - (new shoes)" Beyonce (I am Sasha Fierce!)

6.  "Postcard" Jordin Sparks (not bad RandB for an American Idol) (but she ain't no Sasha Fierce)

7. "Postcard" The Babys (OH MY GOD I'd TOTALLY forgotten this band - and YES I played their 45 "Every Time I Think of You" about a million times in 1980)

8. "The Postcard" Robbie Williams (folksy 21st century Brit - easy on the eyes)

9. "Postcards From Richard Nixon" Elton John (Sir Elton gets political, plays great piano, and mentions Steve McQueen)

10. "Postcard" The Who (Quadrophenia! 1973!)

11. "Send Me a Postcard" Shocking Blue (Dutch rock band circa 1967 - who knew Grace Slick had competition across the pond? ROCKIN')

12. "Life During Wartime" [don't say The] Talking Heads (original inspiration)

And this is the edited version. There's actually enough out there for a double album.