E-MAIL AND CHRISTMAS CARDS

I love e-mail for one very good reason. We've moved from one place to another and many of our friendships and relatives have been reduced to a Christmas card per year. They are the people we know and love, who have busy lives as we have. We rarely see them, never forget them, but time displaces the closeness you once had.
E-mail changes that. You can zap off a quick note once a month, or once a day, like neighbors over a fence. You can share a cute picture or send a joke and keep more personally in touch. I've cursed this machine, but I'm grateful for its ease of communication. I just relocated old square dancing buddies, Dave and Sandy Barron and we exchanged about 10 years of catching-up.

The Post Office, once the only profitable government institution, has suffered because of e-mail. People don't send as many cards as they used to because of e-mail. E-cards are animated, beautiful and enjoyable. But paper cards, especially Christmas cards, have their own appeal to me.
Over the years I've collected every greeting card and post card ever sent to me. And, those of my parents, friends and anybody who was willing to share their's. I have a huge collection of greeting cards in scrapbooks, and I never get tired of them.

  Many of them are themed, such as dog cards, or cat cards, or Santa cards. It started when I was a 2nd grader. My mother was writing out her Christmas cards. In the stack was a Santa card with a fuzzy red suit, both his front and back, with the famous poem, "T'was The Night Before Christmas," on the inside. Oh, how I wanted that card to be my very own. Mom wouldn't relent, no matter how much I begged. But happiness was assured when I found the card on the Christmas Tree Christmas morning addressed to me. I was hooked.

Now, I never let a card get away.

We are the rat-packers of the world. Without us, much of history would be lost. Some say we are insane. But, I care not. I love my old cards and letters, Christmas and otherwise. Merry, Merry!