I have no sealing wax. And I do not spend the evening with light from an oil lamp. My hair is up like my eyes and my thoughts, all through the night. Even the stars can’t help in the haze, they are kept away through toils of clouds which gobble up the sky. My penmanship is more than a pity. It’s muslin cut with a blunt scissor, not silk with razor straight edges and double backed seams. It frays in places and leaves too much fabric in others. But I still sit with a pen, paper and try to find something to say. There is a post box at the corner of my home. The daily messenger comes once on weekdays at 11 — give or take a few minutes — and Saturday at spot on 10. I watch the faces of people putting their bills to bed. The official blue box. The handle is metal in a wide little oval and has lost its paint. It smells like everyone else’s hands. But it is not bent or worn thin. You open the straight blue door, the flat rectangle like an envelope with a backwards pull, then put the letters on the ledge. Slide them away like burned old bread no one wants to eat. Children bound out of cars, clutching piles of envelopes with sly smiles. They put them down one at a time. They let the door whack itself back up with the slap, clap, clong sound of metal lips pursing themselves shut. But we have forgotten how to write a letter. The box is filled with bills and other envelopes requiring our personal checks. Or Hallmark cards that bear our signature and date, much like the check written for lawn care. We send notes all the time, e-mails and instant interruptions. But we have lost the art of sitting down to think — what is it we would like to say, and how can we put it in such a way that you would want to remember it? What do we know you need to hear? How can we share a laugh, just because we thought of you and wanted to paint a smile in the cracks of your long day at work? We are all far too busy with other things. And there are no stamps lying about in the desk drawer and envelopes and stationery are other little bears growling at us. There is the matter of the ink being completely stuck in the pen after the page has your name and a comma. But we have forgotten this process for the convenience of other things to do and get done. The computer is there, like a telephone with no sound, and lets us speak. Just hit reply and tell me something. Technology teaches us not to remember to say hello in a long smile. It corrects our spelling. Our voices become like gallops between the other things to do. A letter can rest beside you on the pillow and be that little chat before you turn to sleep. It’s still there in the morning and can be tucked in your pocket. There is always the night, and a low watt bulb. Paper somewhere, even if its slips in the kitchen. There is the quiet of the dark, even when the city has set its heat and smog against the stars. The time is there to write letters. When you are all awake and words lose their densities and can say what they mean with no grand ornaments. You can see our face in the pages. Letters tell us time. They are private conversations to sip when the winter is cold and long. They take you to a little carving out of time in time. ]]>