The Letter I purchased a basket of old letters at an antique shop on Saturday. I collect ephemera for use in my design work. When I picked up the basket initially I just thought it a random sampling of letters. There was no price on them so I took them to the register. I offered to buy them all and I got a fair price for the taking. As it turns out, the letters were all written to the same woman and were from the 1920s and 1930s. Her name was Carrie. Each letter is a little story and all are so endearingly touching. I sat there in the car holding the clues to this woman's life in my hands and I felt the power, the magnitude of what I held. This is why I have always loved treasure troving. It is, in essence, a form of interpersonal archeology where we find clues to someone's life that we can, if we so chose, follow. Or we can choose to make up our own stories or rewrite the stories by making these ephemeral things part of our brief moment in this place through our art or our literature or the fertile ground of our imagination.

As I rummaged through the pile I found a one page letter on simple lined paper with some tape attached. It was dated 11/6/28. Then I found a small photograph in the bottom of the bag of a man with a banjo on his knee (just like the song.) It was obvious that the photo had once been attached to the letter. This letter was so heartfelt that I cried after reading it. Around the photo he'd taped to the back of the letter he wrote "Happy then, but not now." Then across the back it says, "I love you always. Joe Brown. Keep this or send it back." Under where the photo had been taped it said, "This is for remembrance of me. I cared for you, a lot." What Carrie did in reply I don't know, but she did keep the photo and it seems that she scrawled across the top of the letter, "Good."

Now that...is a story waiting to be told.

Isn't it just the way of things? We realize what we truly wanted after it's already slipped through our fingers...it's the story that has no beginning and no end.

This letter, this image, these remnants from the life of a woman from long ago-these things have deep resonance. The detritus of our existence may end up fading away into the great cosmic dust bin or perhaps someone, somewhere in the future yet to be told may find our letters one day and wonder who we were and what they mean.

We do leave an imprint upon this world, however small it might be in the grand scheme of things. That's something to ponder, isn't it?

I will be out most of today, so please don't worry if your comment isn't there, I'll approve when I return. Until tomorrow, Create Without Filters^TM.

xoxo,
Margot