The scenario on a recent journey to Michigan:
I was sitting in my grandparents living room with my immediate family gathered, sheltered from the subarctic temperatures outdoors. My Aunt B and Uncle F has just spent the afternoon visiting with us. When Aunt B made it safely home she called to say she had a letter from Ghana waiting for her. Not so exciting considering we were able to catch up face-to-face minutes before. Regardless, a handwritten letter can (in my world) brighten anyones day--after all I wrote it knowing I was coming home. Per usual I am getting lost in my thoughts.
We left off with Aunt B's first phone call which took place with Pops. She called again two minutes later, this time talking to the youngest H. The room was curious, waiting, anticipating, why might she be calling again? To tell us it was her calling in the first place. Yes, Aunt B the called ID told us, the first and the second time.
Growing up my neighbors had a rotary dial phone, and now there is hardly even a use for landlines. Everyone has a cell phone that uses caller identification, mine even goes so far to include a picture of the caller. Aunt B continues to send me beautifully constructed hand written letters while my grandmother still writes to me on the typewriter she got when she was 12, by my calculation that's 74 years ago. It's so fun to receive real mail. I genuinely appreciate the patience and time it takes to sit down and actually write a letter. In today's hectic world where anyone can zip me an email in record time I'd rather wait. This rapidly changing 'age of technology' is even hard for me to keep up with.
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