Letter #82 - Alexei

When I was in college I worked in the cafeteria in my dorm for a couple of years.  My first semester I met Alexei, a Russian grad student who was also working in the caf.  Alexei and I hit it off almost instantly, and truth be told I had a big crush on him until we discovered he was 10 years older than me and that was just too big a gap at that life stage.  Age and crush aside, we had SO MUCH FUN working together, he has an awesome sense of humour and we would just laugh and laugh through our entire shift whenever we worked together.  We would also try to get our breaks together so we could keep the conversation going.

Before I even finished my time at school Alex and I lost touch.  When I moved off campus and he stopped working at the caf we drifted and lost track of each other.  Until last month.  I received a message in my inbox on Facebook asking if I was the same Rachel from Case Hall Caf... I was floored.  Here was my crazy Russian again, I was so excited to hear from him!  Alex is back in Russia now and I was glad to hear he is doing well and updates on his life.  I asked for his address (snail mail) so I could make him a part of this project and today's mail is carrying off a letter to Russia with greetings, updates and photos!

I look forward to hearing back from him, whether online or via snail mail, I hope the letter arrives alright, he said Russian mail service can be pretty shady sometimes.  In any case it's been very cool reconnecting with such a cool old friend :o)

Letter Responses

I have received a few responses from people who have been recipients of letters from this project thus far, and most have been these incredibly sincere notes, sent with much love, much thought, and much gratitude.  This response I received this evening is no exception to this, except that it goes above and beyond in effort and dedication as a blog reader.  I was so impressed, touched, and blown away by the ending to this note... I hope you all enjoy it as much as I did :o)

i have a confession to make...

...I love your snail mail letter campaign. I am honored to be a part of it. My family has a strong connection with a couple of families from the town I grew up in that have spanned about 6 generations and we still have regular clan gatherings. The matriarch of the real driving family in the clan once told me that letters are a part of our soul. They are better than phone calls because you can touch and read them over and over again and they have permanence and phone calls don't. I have always honored that and do so more in the email world where writing has become passe. Her husband, who passed away in 1990 (she passed in 2004), is easily the most influential person in my life but she is a close second. I still make most decisions based upon what they would think of what I am doing. It is easy to say if you like my values, you have them to thank for them.

Why am I writing this? Don't laugh. Our youngest dog tends to eat mail. He ate your letter and i have been painstakingly rebuilding it from the pieces to where I can read it and I am almost there. I should finish it when I get home this weekend. And then I can actually read it!

Letter #69 - Jared

If you haven't figured it out by now, I'm a family girl.  I love my family deeply and rely heavily on them for support and fun.  My life is one of frequent uprooting due to my father's career for most of my life, which meant that for the first 21 years, my mom dad and brother were my only real constant in life.  As a result, we are much closer knit than I think a lot of families are, even when we drive each other bonkers.

I am the oldest child in my family, I have one sibling, my "baby" brother (1.5 years younger than me) Jared.  Jared is everything a brother is supposed to be, annoying, too chatty, a little bit of a tattle tale, not quite as quick on the uptake as me, fun to be around, way smarter than me in some areas, funny, charming, helpful and caring.  I've posted several blogs about my brother in the past (on other blogs) and about how much I adore him.  When I got married, one of the toughest transitions for both of us was it was the first time in our lives that "home" was no longer the same space for us.  When I was in college, I still came home, when I graduated, I moved home, Jared and I have lived together our entire lives, and suddenly "going home" meant a place where he wasn't.  We have grown to be such close friends and that was a real struggle.  Thankfully my new home is a manageable distance from him, and I actually live only a couple of miles from where he works, so we still find time to spend together, even if it isn't nearly as frequent as I would like.

Last weekend Jared did me a real solid (as he often does) and took the night out to spend with me and get me to a gig of my husbands that was several hours away.  He offered to go because he knew I was pretty much dead on my feet tired, and that this particular gig was really important to me to attend.  We ended up frantically assembling cds for 30 minutes when he arrived to pick me up (my husband is notorious for not remembering to even have cds ready let along with him at gigs), then almost 2 hours visiting on the drive there, time there (and gambling a little together - it was a casino gig), then the almost 2 hour ride home where he dropped me off.  It was such a great treat, not only because I get very lonely with my life (I'm often home alone during the day with limited transportation options) but also because it had been awhile since my brother and I had so much time to just hang out together, outside of some other something going on.

My letter to Jared allowed me to thank him for spending that time with me, and to remind him of how much I love him, and that even though I am thrilled to have moved into this new chapter of my life, I still miss having him around all the time, and wish we got to see each other more.

If you have a sibling you don't get to spend much time with, please use this entry as inspiration to make an intentional effort to get in touch with them, or to schedule some time with them!

Letter #64 - Ben

I seem to have a talent for understanding the misunderstood.  Ben and I became friends mostly because of this talent of mine.  Ben is often misunderstood.  He is hilarious, has a wicked dry sense of humour, and is super smart.  He's also a deeply caring person with an incredibly strong faith.  He's very set in his ways, and comfortable with that, and sometimes he struggles to express his passion in ways that don't come of as mean or pushy.  In spite of this, I get him.  Ben and I were housemates for several years and I absolutely loved living with him.  He was the kind of friend I could find myself trapped in conversation with for hours in the hall or on the stairs until we both realised we were supposed to be doing other things and would reluctantly head our separate ways.  I always knew when he was kidding, when he was serious, and when he was sleep deprived (usually because he would start making seemingly mean jokes about my virtue lol).  Ben and I developed a special friendship that I think will always make him one of those people in my life who no matter how long it's been since we've spoken or seen each other, time will stand still and we will pick up right where we left off.

I was bummed this year because I had to turn down an opportunity to spend a week with Ben chaperoning a mission trip for this year's spring break kids.  This event began when we lived together, and it was so awesome to be asked to come back and be a part of it again, it's just that life made it bad timing for me, so I had to say no.  I really hope I get another chance because I truly regretted having to say no.  The idea of getting to spend a week hanging out with Ben was awesome and I wish I had been able to jump on board.  Turning down the trip however did make me realise how much I've neglected my friendship with him these past few years, and made me want to change that for the future.  So I wrote him a letter and sent him some love.  I hope it proves to be a good first step toward restoring our contact and that it leads to more time together and fewer gaps inbetween.

So raise your glass with me... to Ben's glass eye!  :o)

Letter #61 - Tammy

I have mentioned before how great my cousins are.  Tammy is no exception.  As I've grown older, the age gap between me and my cousins on my dad's side of the family has become less important, and we've all grown to be good friends.  If I had to pick one word to describe Tam it would be spunky.  She's hilarious, kind hearted and knows her way around the kitchen (are you noticing a trend on the van Rossum side yet? lol) she and my brother are actually probably closer than she and I, but I love her all the same and according to her status updates on facebook recently, she needed a little extra love.  So I sent her a card with a big hug and a smile and well wishes for a better week ahead.  Knowing the Canadian Postal Service, she may not get my card until next year, but hey, one can hope :o)

Writing to Tammy made me think about family gatherings to come, that side of the family has really tried hard the last several years to get together on a regular basis again.  When I was a kid we always did Christmas, then as we grew older it fell by the wayside.  Now a lot of my cousins have their own kids and it's become a priority for us all again, which has been really nice.  This year we're actually in the process of trying to get an Easter gathering together as well.  I'm not sure yet if it's going to work out for my husband and I to go, but we're hoping we can.  I love my family, as insane as they are, and look forward to spending time with my cousins because I don't get to very often.

Letter #15 - Oma

I hate to confess, I am not always the best granddaughter.  I love my Oma dearly, don't get me wrong, but I'm really bad at keeping in touch with her.  We haven't lived very close to her for most of my life, which means the best I can do most of the time is write or call... neither of which I do very often.

Today I decided to do better at that, so I started by sending her a letter.  My Oma is awesome.  She's Dutch by birth and immigrated to Canada when my dad was three years old.  She's hilarious and a great cook... I have yet to master her soup making skills!  She's very religious but in an oh-so-Dutch was :o)  Anyone who meets her instantly understands my and my dad's sense of humour much better.  She once spent about 30 minutes telling me about her 'new boyfriend'.  When she asked if I wanted to see a photo, she pulled a picture of the Pope out of her wallet.  She's not catholic, or senile.  It was hilarious.

If anyone reading this is lucky enough to still have living grandparents, send them a note, give them a call, or go visit them this week.  Oma's the last living grandparent I have, and I need to appreciate her better while that's still true!