Ten minutes to write. Less time to read.

The pen and paper approach to writing letters is on the endangered species list of social graces, because snail mail simply hasn’t evolved as much as its cousin, the email.

However, there is a certain pleasure in opening one’s physical mailbox and finding more than a bevy of bills or a collection of catalogs inside; and the rare handwritten letter that finds its way to my door makes me feel special. I smile and mentally thank its sender.

Time was when previous generations wrote copiously. My grandmother and her older sisters corresponded back and forth every week for years. My mother and one of her best friends from nursing school did too. Even I carried on a three-year correspondence with my friend, Carol, when I moved away from St. Louis and she stayed behind. She saved all my letters, and today they are a hilarious glimpse of the teenage years we shared.

Maybe email is encouraging a renaissance in letter writing, but it is a different kind of communication altogether. Even if you print the email, it doesn’t have the same personal feel as a letter written in the familiar script of a close friend or relative. Someday, hand written letters may be totally extinct, so if you have one that you treasure, you might want to do what Earl did. He framed and displays a charming letter from his mother written in 1987. It’s not a bad way to decorate a shelf.