The personality of a card

Happy Thanksgiving! I hope today is a day full of family time and blessings to you. Hopefully, you'll be spending time with family and friends, and in addition to giving thanks, I hope you can also find some time today to #writethanks.

If you’ve been following along with me this past week, I hope you’ve enjoyed these #writethanks stories as much as I have enjoyed writing them. There are so many people out there who value the gift that written encouragement brings to a person.

I grew up around a print shop. The smell of fresh ink and paper gives me joy and makes me feel at home. Experimenting with different paper textures is a hobby of mine. I love to see how ink absorbs into linen paper compared to how it soaks into laid. I love to round corners, and I love that my paper cutter is so dull right now that it gives the edge of my cards rough sides. The paper tells a story just as much as the words do.

When I’m reading a hand-written note, the words on the paper come to life off the page. I see a small circle stain and wonder, “Was this person drinking coffee as they were writing?” I see a smudge on a word and see evidence that someone touched the paper right in that spot. I see a person’s train of thought when a word is crossed out and replaced with another one — a better word that person thought would make more sense. Handwriting isn’t perfect. It can be messy and disorganized. It’s as unique as your thumbprint, and it’s all yours. Handwriting humanizes communication in a way that we can all relate to, and it makes encouragement that much more personal.

From my perspective, writing a note to someone gives your words a personality they can only have through written words. The paper you write on has personality. Your handwriting evokes specific feelings from a reader. By displaying your own handwriting, you’re giving that person a piece of you, and it’s a gift.

Sending an email, text, or Facebook message is quick and immediate, but that’s exactly the reason we should #writethanks and all kinds of other thoughts. Slow down! Think about your words. Go to the trouble of doing something so simple to encourage someone. They may treasure it forever.