A Pen Pal

Posted on by Parul Thakur
penpals
Picture Credits

When I was in school there was this fad of having pen friends. With no emails and fixed line phones being the latest technology in those days, hand written letters used be the medium of communication between people who wanted to stay in touch. We would receive letters and we would send letters – to relatives, cousins or friends. But I never had a pen friend. Some of my class mates who had pen pals used to rave about their friendship over letters, how knowing someone just with words and that handwriting meant so much and of course the excitement of knowing someone out of your own zone.

Over the last two years, blogging has given me a lot of friends. People who I haven’t met but align with my thoughts and views, those who like me through the lenses of what I write and those who always stop by to inspire and help me write creatively. Recently, I met a person (let’s call him/her Q) with who I struck a chord instantly. We both are passionate about women issues around the world, and apart from geography the thing that distinguishes us is that Q works to make things better. I on the other hand, write to create awareness, motivate or express myself. So, over a couple of comments we wrote a mail to each other and realized we have so much in common excluding blogging.

We deliberately wanted to stay away from Social Media and connecting over it. While Q has seen many of my pictures – my blog is photo friendly, I haven’t seen Q or know much on a personal level. But that is not a deterrent to our budding friendship. We just want to have a friend from across the border who we can relate to, express, share ideas and someday meet if life gives us that chance. I want to have a pen pal from a distant land who knows me through my letters. Oh I agree that handwritten letters have taken the shape of hand typed emails but the personal touch is still there. We talk of interests, food preferences and how we feel about issues. Q shares things that I would have never thought of and I share my weekend plans. We are exploring many aspects of our personalities and we kind of tested numerology too on our birth dates.

Life gives us a lot of chances to meet people and know them. Sometimes I wonder how many people we all must have met till date in our lives. It’s so hard to put a number to it but it is very easy to learn something from the people we meet or interact with. With Q, I feel I am having something to learn and look forward to. Q’s mails bring a smile to my face and I wonder what new picture I will get to see and what new world will open up to me. If I could meet my school mates once again, I would have certainly shared about my new pen pal.

As I take up the Write Tribe Festival of Words #4, on Day 1 today, I want you to step out of the comfort zone and do something new. Find a friend outside of work, travel to the mall alone, ride a bicycle once again, smile at a stranger, stop and admire the beauty of nature, train yourself to listen to the din as if it was music, look within and spread joy and tell someone how much they mean to you! Life is short and we don’t know what lies ahead. So smile and keep going.

51 thoughts on “A Pen Pal”

  1. How lovely, Parul! I would love to have someone like you as a ‘pen pal’ too! 🙂
    I used to have a pen pal in school. She lived in Australia, but had roots in India. Strangely, through my family, I was able to connect her grandmother with her long lost relatives who also lived in Australia! Sadly, at 16, this girl got pregnant and married soon after. I guess we became too different then and slowly lost touch.

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    1. How nice of you to say so Corinne! 🙂
      See, there said my post – almost every one had Pen Pals but I had none…
      about losing touch – I always quote this and you will hear it from me “Life is like a set of rooms and each room has a set of people. You move from room to room and meet new people. Some people come along with you to the next room but some are left behind”..This girl did not walk along with you to the next room.. Right ? May be it’s time to make a new one!

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  2. Aha! Pen Pals. I had 2, one from Australia and one from USA. It was so wonderful and beautiful writing to them and exchanging notes for 3-4 years. Sometime ago, I searched for them on Facebook, but couldnt find them. Glad that you connected with Q. It is great to meet like minded people!

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  5. I remember those days .. I used to have two penpals and one of them is a very good friend now and we are still in touch..

    Both were in Australia and a few years ago i visited the country and met them both.. had a lovely couple of days up in the mountains of woollengong. .

    I would love to have a few more penpals. . The art of writing letters is lost maybe we can start it again. …

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  6. I didn’t have pen pals as a child but did as an adult. There was one in particular I lost track of and would love to know (it’s been some 30 years) how her life has turned out. It’s beautiful that you are making an online friend – a true friendship. I know people online, but these people come and go. It would be nice to make a lasting friend online, but I find it hard to open up to people. Still, perhaps, one day.

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  8. I did not have pen pals as a child. At the age of 9 when I moved to a new place owing to my father’s transferable job, I remained connected, for the next 2 years, to my best friend from the previous place through letters. I used to wait anxiously to receive her’s after posting mine. But then we lost touch and I could never find her again.
    Being friends with somebody without meeting them but knowing one another very well through their thoughts and work, I believe it to be soul-gratifying. It was a wonderful post to read. To look within and to spread joy will be high on my agenda.

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  9. I remember writing to my friends in the vacation. It was so much fun, having Pen Pals. Even writing Thank you notes was so awesome then. I miss getting letters now a days.

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  12. We seriously should go back to the time of pen pals. Though I still write letters for my husband, writing and posting it is something else altogether. Even I have made such wonderful friends via my blog. We stay in touch via mails and that is such an awesome feeling.

    So I know exactly what you mean 🙂

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  13. in a time when finding friends with the same interest is only on fb or twitter, it is so nice to stay away from all of it and connect over letters. more personal, more human and less dramatic. Craving to have a pen pal after reading this. thanks!

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  14. I’ve tried so hard to find a pen pal but it is just so difficult!

    But yes, blogs are a great way to meet people, I’ve made SO many blog friends over the last 7 years, its been a wonderful ride.

    Hmm, stepping out of my comfort zone, I shall update you on that soon 🙂

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  15. Ye once, having a pen-friend was an expression of status apart from being kind of friendly with a person almost unknown. Me lived in a remote Kerala village during most of my childhood days and came to know about PPs only during my college days and never got one for myself. The unknown can inspire imagination and creativity. In what a revolutionary way has now blogs and FB replaced PPs.

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  17. One thing on my bucket list is to find a pen pal. But its so difficult to find a pen pal. You are lucky to have found a great one. But I do agree blog is a fantastic place to make new and great friends.

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  18. Wow! Parul I can so relate to this post! I, too, loved writing letters to my cousins and a couple of pen pals I was lucky to have and brag about to my school mates! Now, thanks to blogging, I too have met some really interesting people with whom I bonded instantly and communicate regularly. It sure feels wonderful receiving mails from them from time to time. In fact, I wrote a letter (yes, a hand written letter) to one of my pen pals the other day. It felt awkward writing without the use of emoticons etc, and the handwriting came out so awful. But, the joy of writing to a pen pal was boundless! I am so glad I am ‘here’ and get to meet people everyday, from whom, as you said, I get to learn something valuable. Ooh! So many feelings came gushing forward on reading your post, Parul! :)) Happy friendship to you!

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    1. I am glad to hear that this post brought back some good memories Shilpa. You are lucky, you had Pen Pals in school. That was the best time but now as well these mails and our blogs are of course a way to communicate. Thank you for stopping by and Happy Friendship to you too!! 🙂

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  20. Haha! Brought back so many memories. I wrote a lot of letters AFTER school, to my classmates. That’s when we’d all moved to different parts of the country for our educations. Never had a pen pal though. I did have an email pal once when the internet was still fairly new in India. We exchanged just about half a dozen emails and then lost touch with each other. Blogging gave me a better pen pal. Several pen pals actually. And I got to meet some of them in real life too eventually!

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  21. Glad to meet someone from back when pen pals were considered cool. I remember there used to be children’s magazines with addresses of kids from other countries who would be interested in becoming pen pals. I loved the idea and did write to some of them. However I have no recollection of any sustained correspondence so I guess I wouldn’t have made friends. I do remember writing to my school friends during summer vacations – sounds so strange now when everyone is just a phone call away.

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    1. Actually you are right – there was something like addresses and now I’m able to recall when you mentioned. Thank you for that!! Yes, I wrote to cousins and friends too 🙂

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  22. I did not have a pen pal. But here in the blogging world I found a lot of friends. There is a few who I know only through their names and writings, still good friends. 🙂 Great post, Parul.

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  23. Pen pal? Eh, Wazzat?
    Not many people in my age group are into pen-pals and all.. We prefer WhatsApp to letter writing.. And I doubt any of us could resist the need (or better, compulsion) to follow each other on Social Networking Sites.
    I didn’t really regret not having a pen pal till the moment i reached the last line of your blog post.

    *runs off to hunt for a pen pal* 😛

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  25. Hey, you brought back lot of memories. I had 3 penpals – 1 Greek, 1 German and 1 Tunisian. Frankly, i was not even aware of the country Tunisia till then. My greek penpal lasted the longest. we last communicated when I was 23. My only anguish, I have not been able to find her online at all.

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  26. I am sure there’s a lot of fun in having pen pals. It’s quite an interesting experience exchanging experiences about life, cultures etc. etc. I guess blogging is quite a good medium which connects us to so many like minded people :).

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