Member-only story
This Is Us
How Pen Pals Are Saving Me
A quarantine tale
For me, the single best thing about this last year — a year of unrivaled loss, sadness, rage, and anxiety — has been the mail. Corresponding with strangers has brought me happiness, fulfillment, and a sort of peace that’s lacking elsewhere in this untethered world. It’s as if these missives from afar are somehow anchoring me in place, rooting me in my own life, and forcing me to slow down, pay attention.
I tentatively joined writer Rachel Syme’s #penpalooza early last summer — early in the pandemic — if only just to “feel something,” as the kids say. Rachel’s Twitter is a riot of joy, with book recs, playlists, bath talk, and a Perfume Genie (in which she guides you to the scent of your poetic desires). There are deep dives on tea, fashion, film, and shopping. It’s a perfect mix of intellectual observation, culture guidance, and buzzy gossip. Rachel is our cruise director, entertaining us on the high plague seas. By creating Penpalooza — a pen pal exchange where people sign up to send and receive letters to and from strangers — she has connected more than 10,000 of us from over 50 countries in this season of isolation. And we are all better for it, in so many ways.
Pen pals, prior to this diversion, meant childhood to me. Bored girls and a few boys, kitty cat stickers, and…
