Letters and unending guilt

The Boston Herald

BEVERLY BECKHAM

Some are piled in a box on a table. Some sit in a black plastic tray on my desk.

I divided them when they arrived. The to-be-answered-immediately, I placed in the tray. The to-be-answered-later, I stacked in the box.

I shouldn't have put them in either place. I should have stopped what I was doing and written back right then, but I didn't for a million reasons. I was in the middle of something. I was walking out the door. I wanted to think about what to say. I wanted to write more than a quick note. Something or someone else needed my attention.

Now the letters are reminders of commitments not kept, relationships left unattended. I look at them and feel irresponsible and guilty and totally unappreciative.

I got a letter before Christmas from a toll keeper in New Hampshire. She had written to me once before, and I'd answered. Then she wrote again, enclosing two pieces of writing she thought I'd enjoy.

I loved what she sent. One of the essays was so moving I cried reading it. I remember sitting in the family room sobbing, handing it to my husband who read it and was moved, too.

I no longer remember the subject of the piece. But it touched me then. So I set it aside along with the letter that accompanied it because it deserved more than a cursory response. I put it a special place, because it was special, and I promised myself I'd attend to it after the holidays when I had more time.

But time is something there seems to be less of every day. When I finally went looking for the letter a few weeks ago, I couldn't find it.

This woman, whom I've never met, took time out of her life, at the busiest season of the year, to send me something that she loved, that she thought I'd love, which I did - and I never even thanked her. Now I can't, because I've lost her letter and her address.

A while ago, I was telling a friend how for years I was fastidious about my mail. I never let it accumulate for more than a month. I'd spend nights and weekends answering it if I had to, because it seemed to me then, as it seems to me now, that when people take the time to write, they deserve a response.

So when did I start slacking off? When did the mail get ahead of me? Some of the letters I haven't yet answered were written as long ago as last summer. "Answer three a day," my friend said. "Chip away at it. You might not ever finish, but it will make you feel better."

So I did. I answered three a day for four days. But it didn't make me feel better at all. It made me feel worse. A man grieving over the death of his wife, shared his pain with me, and I had let his letter lay unanswered for months. Another man sent poetry. "What do I think?" he asked. "I've tried to get them published. Do you have any suggestions?" His poems are wonderful. But because I didn't write back, he must think they are not. A lady who sent me a book, (did I ever thank her?) wrote me a follow-up note in November, which I know I haven't answered. A couple wrote about the death of their daughter in a drunken driving accident, and I didn't respond.

"You need to hire someone to answer your mail," all the organized people in my life say. "Or send out a standard letter."

But I can't do this. I don't want to do this. Most of the letters I receive are full of the person who writes. I want to write back. And I will.

It's just that life gets in the way. Work and home and commitments and obligations and fun, too. And the letters got put on a back shelf.

Future ones will not be put on any shelf or in any box or in a tray. They will be answered promptly as they arrive - honest they will.