Who doesn't like to receive scented letters with little silk ribbons tied around them, proclaiming undying love, hugs and kisses? And how many years has it been since a friendly postman rang his cycle bell and handed over one such letter to me, winking mischievously? Hmm...that would be 26 years.Sometimes, what we call progress is not all about progress, it's also a loss of what was precious albeit quaint. Packets of bits and bytes can never hope to replace the essence of an old fashioned letter - what we smell from it is more than the light fragrance of a perfume...it's the essence of time, effort and thoughts spent in writing by hand what one holds close to one's heart and what one can never hope to speak out aloud...but only pour out in black and white, beside a dim bedside lamp and a window overlooking a starry night sky...
So, here's one such letter, not old-fashioned by any stretch of imagination but a letter all the same, made up of bits and bytes and my muse to tie it together :)
11 comments:
Not only letters, even telegrams and phonograms have become passe, in this age of emails and cellphones.
This friend of mine would write paper and ink letters, and get letters (sometimes verse) back (from India) in painstaking calligraphy written with black ink and a wide nibbed dip pen. (Who writes with dip pens anymore?). But, thank the powers that be, no perfume or silk ribbons.
And, excuse me while I digress.
*shudders* @ "perfume".
There's this place in the mall - near one of the doors. Women's cosmetics or something - bunch of women in white coats dabbing stuff on other women's faces. Everytime I walk through there, I feel suffocated. The smell of that place is OVERBEARING. If it was upto me, I'd book them for public endangerment and nuisance. </rant>
/me shakes head at women and perfume.
Friendly advice to the non-writer-of-letters - discover the joys of MS Cursive, google and a good inkjet printer. She's happy, you're happy. :P
jinguchakka: true!
anm: When I wrote this post, I imagined a thoughtful person writing with a dip pen :)
I am not a perfume person but I love agarbathis...think of the mild fragrance of the letters as the smell of agarbathis if that would make you shudder less :)
I should forward this post to a certain friend of mine for whom I wrote a letter on hand-made paper late in the night by the candle light with Bhimsen Joshi's aalaap running in my tape!! The two of us made a pact to write to each other!!!
Went through that letter.....contrary to what some1 had mentioned,i found it absolutely passionate!
And there was so much "read between the lines" in that proposal.The last 2lines touched me,a high selfrespect woman's heart potrayed perfectly well.
good job RS :)
you got very well under the skin of the person you had in mind.. it was a nice write RS.
To agnibarathi: lovely pact, do keep it up :)
To samudraa: I like the last two lines too...Thanks :)
To ram: More an imaginary person...Thanks :)
RS,its true that paper letters have their own charm!!!
Me and my friend still fondly remember the one paper mail which I wrote to him 8 yrs before.But I cant say the same abt so many emalis/SMS which we have exchanged. Instant communication does not have the same impact as Plain old paper mails!
for the same reason, as everybody else has mentioned, i guess paper-greetings are THE BEST in contrast to the now-so-popular e-greetings..and birthday/wedding invitations, etc.... :)
labdab: amen!
phil: yes...although I dont receive (m)any these days, sigh!
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