Nothing Beats a Letter

There are a lot of 'things' I have that are precious to me...my engagement ring, my wedding band, my 'Jesse' bracelet.  But if I had to pick just one material item I love the most, the one I would grab in a fire{after my kids, husband, dogs, fish, etc} is this.


This plastic envelope may not look like anything special, but it's what inside that means the most.

These are the letters from 'my boys'...my military men.  They are war letters.

It also holds all the letters Skip wrote to me from Jersey when I was at school in CT, when he was training in California, and from Iraq.

They are letters from my family, friends, and even a few complete strangers complete strangers.  My cousin or my friend would send me the name of some guys in his unit that weren't getting much mail and I would add them to my daily letter-writing list.
You see things are different over there now then they were when the wars first started.  Back then there was no Skype, computers in your room {most of them didn't have actual rooms to sleep in}, email, or phone calls.  So all they had were pen to paper, hold in your hand, letters {it was a little better when Skip was there as we had email and some phone calls}

Each letter tells a story, giving me just the tiniest sliver of a glimpse into what was going on over there.  Some had a fine layer of sand and grit all over, not unlike the writer himself I'm sure.  Sometimes they were filled with jokes, football picks, and meaningless filler as the writer tried to take his mind off what was going on over there.  Sometimes they were filled with details about the latest mission they had been on...bullet flying...who had been hit with shrapnel.  Sometimes they were filled with longing for home and all the things they would do once they got back.  Sometimes there was an overtone of fear coursing through the letter.  Those were the worst because there was nothing I could do to help ease their fears.  As much as you try, pen and paper can never be a hug.

And the letters from Skip?  Just beautiful.  They contained a mixture of emotions like the others, but they were mainly just about his love for me.  :)  In the letters we made plans for the future we could only hope we would have.  We talked about all the things we missed about each other and all the things we would do when he got home.  They were funny, sad, sentimental, and brightened my day each and every time I found one in my mailbox.

Cause that's the thing with letters.  Sure it's nice to open your inbox and amongst all the junk mail there's a real email from someone.  But there is nothing better than finding a letter in the mail.  Holding it in your hands, knowing it came from half-way across the globe.  And when it's your fiance writing the letter...makes everything feel romantic and kinda like a Nicholas Sparks book.

One day I'll show these letters to my girls, to give them a human aspect to a war that they'll just read about in history books.  But it was a war their daddy lived through, and their godfather, and my friends.  And in a teeny tiny, sitting at home all snuggly warm on my couch, I really have no idea kind of way, through these letters I lived it too. 

These letters are one of my most prized possessions.  One of the things I would grab if we ever had a fire.  Because they describe a time and a war that changed the way that I looked at the world and how I was living my life.  Because they describe a war that made 'my boys' into men.

And you know what warms my heart even more?  The fact that some of these boys {Skip included of course!} saved some of the letters I sent them.  It helps me to know I really was making a difference in their day.  And that's all I was looking to do. 

It's been a long time since I picked up a pen and paper and wrote a letter to a friend {thankfully because all my boys have been home from the war for a long time now!}  But maybe it's something I should pick up again.  Email, phones calls, texting, those are all great things....but nothing beats a letter.