June 2007
Hi everyone,
This newsletter isn't going to be your standard fare. My wife and I are about to have some work done on our house, and in preparation, we have to move much of our stuff to the garage. Space is limited, so I have to finally go through some old boxes of "miscellaneous". Today I went through several of them, and sure enough, there were old phone bills from when I lived in Walla Walla, some photo ID's from back when I had lots of hair (if you are really nice, I'll scan them in so you can get a good laugh), and catalogs that I kept for some unknown reason.
But in the midst of the three garbage bags worth of junk, I found piles of old birthday and Christmas cards, old letters going back to high school, and some of my early creative writings. I was in a tossing mood, but after reading a few of the old letters, I couldn't bring myself to do it. I was going to toss the old cards, and I did get rid of a lot of them, but I seem to have the kind of friends who write letters in their cards. I can't part with those.
Seeing old friends' names in the return address on envelopes that have gone crinkly with age brought back tidal waves of memories. To be honest, I'm still in a bit of a daze. If were a science fiction writer (oh wait...) I'd be able to write a scene where people can backup and restore memories from disk. Whoa. There's a serious rush as your brain dusts off old neural connections that haven't communicated in ages. I close my eyes and images of my old friends flash in and out. The air seems to press down on me, and I feel slightly detached, the way you do when something momentous is happening. The way you feel when you're going through one of life's one-way doors and nothing will ever be the same.
Or maybe it's the wine I had at dinner. But I don't think so. I've had revelations like this before. I know, because I wrote this sort of scene into A Clockwork Murder. I just didn't expect to be going through it again right now. I've been so focused on the future and achieving my many goals in life that I forgot about my past. Well, I didn't forget, but it did slip my mind.
Like Zook, I feel the need to reconnect with my old friends. Fortunately, my friends and I are the sort who can pick up right where we left off without it seeming weird, or without the need to dwell on the fact that it has been a while. I guess that is a sign of true friendship when time and distance aren't a factor.
An old friend from college IM'ed me the other day to tell me how much he enjoys the newsletter. That really meant a lot to me. I do it every month, but I don't usually get a lot of feedback. I don't expect it, so no big deal, but it makes me feel good to know I'm entertaining someone. Apparently from my old correspondence, I knew a long time ago that I wanted to do something to make the world a better place. If not through research, then through writing. Perhaps someday I'll take his suggestion and publish the newsletters. Of course by the time I have enough material, I'll be a famous writer and we'll all be peer-to-peer file swapping old memories with each other.
Take care and take a moment to do a Google or whatever search on your old friends. Then write to them.
--Todd