Word of the Week - 112

Word of the Week: EPISTLE

As we round the final turn of April, National Letter Writing Month,  as well as National Poetry Month, I realize that my epistolary intentions have, once again, not been matched in reality.  I have nothing to offer in my defense, other than the feeble and familiar declaration that time evaporates.  While I sleep or putter, it shrivels like a puddle under an August sun, leaving me here with plans for witty or heartfelt correspondence and a boatload of pens and paper.

I HAVE sent some notes, a few parcels, a tag or two, even a brief letter written with a fountain pen, one of my higher aspirations.  In case you have doubts on the subject, the fountain pen, in my opinion, is indication that civilization is not extinct.  I am thankful the ink cartridge was invented though I am not finished with pens that still drink from exotically-labeled bottles.  The color choices of fluid ink - and the names they carry - leave me and my kind more than a little woozy.

Reading this week's edition of Brain Pickings, (https://www.brainpickings.org/2016/04/19/einstein-curie-letter/?mc_cid=9a367edebb&mc_eid=9f0b4f4f89) I learned that letters written between Marie Curie and the man she loved after Pierre's sudden death were stolen and published by a reptilian press to humiliate and discredit her.  She was championed in those grim days by Albert Einstein, whom she had recently met at an invitational science conference.  Einstein, of course, sent his encouraging words via letter.

Regrets deplete us, they stunt our dreams of forward momentum, yet I wish I had saved so many more of the letters I received over a lifetime.  To see familiar handwriting, feel again the quickened pulse brought on by that hoped-for return address in the envelope's corner, would mean more than I could have imagined.

Letters mingle souls, so we've been told and so I believe.  Before April vanishes in the mist, shall we vow to write at least one, or one more, meaningful epistle to one beloved soul?  I know we will all be the better for it.  Yours sincerely.