Letters from the Heart

With Valentine’s Day just around the corner, many of us will receive beautiful cards. Whether from our spouse, significant other, children or grandchildren, the personalized written sentiments will warm our hearts, reinforcing the feeling that we are important to someone, that we are loved.

The cards will sit atop our dressers, if personal, or publicly displayed on the home fridge or our office credenza for all to see. In the weeks ahead, we may re-read them, especially when the inside page is filled with a personal note in the handwriting of our loved one.

Where do YOUR cards go once the holiday passes? My bedroom closet contains three beautiful boxes, filled to the brim of cards my husband and I have exchanged over the past twenty years together – Valentine’s Day, Sweetest Day, Christmas, and hundreds of cards for no reason at all, other than to say “I love you.”

Another box is full of some of the oldest cards imaginable, many saved by my mom and passed down to me, from my christening and first birthday to various cards from my grandparents given to me throughout my childhood.

The final box, the one which can bring me back in time in a heartbeat, is full of old letters and cards from friends and family since I started college. From hand-designed cards from my college roommate (we wanted to start our own greeting card business), to letters from my Grandma B. that always included ‘funny money’ to spend on pizza or the phone bill, to cards and letters from old boyfriends, I still have each and every one of them.

I cannot throw these memories away, and I’ve decided the only difference between hoarders and me is that I use prettier boxes, and treat these pieces of paper with the utmost respect. Strung together, they are the story of my life, the people I love and surrounded myself with.

Just like pulling-out old photo albums, a couple of times a year I will break out these boxes and flip through them, and lose myself in the sweet, funny, crazy memories of grammar school, high school and college. I move to my ‘married’ box and fall in love with my husband over again and again, and realize how much we’ve been through together, and how fortunate we are to be truly happy.

My oldest Valentine’s Day card is from my first grade crush (GZ), a boy who was so cute and I knew would grow up to be President one day. It is a picture of a farmer holding a corncob, and says “By cracky, will you be my valentine?” The little card is still vibrant in color, and his neatly-printed name on the back is faded but legible. Just thinking about it makes me smile, bringing me right back to Miss Mendak’s class at Oak Elementary School.

Keep this little first-grade girl in mind when you purchase this year’s Valentine’s Day cards. Better yet, write all of your loved ones letters from the heart. The gift of your words, unlike flowers or chocolate, is eternal and will be cherished forever. Who knows, your letter may even find a home in a lovely box, and be read and re-read for years to come.