As if we’ve not had enough celebrating already, let’s all continue the festive holiday spirit by joining together to celebrate UNIVERSAL LETTER WRITING WEEK, January 8-14.

Yes, it’s time to pull out all the stops. Drag out the fancy papers and envelopes, buy a fresh set of stamps and maybe a new pen to celebrate and get writing!

Who are you writing this week? How about a letter writing party??

Share your great ideas of how we can all celebrate letter writing week!

This is only marginally about letters. It’s more about good deeds, philanthropy, kindness. The letters come into play because it’s a story from The Depression and people wrote letters back then. This is a story of an anonymous guy doing good things.

When you go read the site, you’ll see a few of the letters he received and there is a picture of some of the letters as well. It’s interesting to look at the handwriting, the rarely-seen scrawl of words across paper. Rarely seen these days, anyway.

It’s a heartwarming story. Go read it. Read it and then ask yourself if there’s anything good you can do for someone today.

Just for you, gentle readers, we’ve sent our army of paparazzi out in search of celebrity letter writers. Our first catch of the day is Violet Affleck who has a wonderful note from Mommy! Check out this great note she’s eating holding. This is a great idea for you to try out if you want to jot a little note to a young family member who might miss seeing your face.

Click on the picture to go to the site so you can see bigger detailed pictures.

Jake at Zoomdoggle is a guy who loves fun. He’s decided to spread the love by sending 1,000 love letters to total strangers. Randomly. And with verve!

Check out this news story about his project. It’s way cool. (Does anyone say “way cool” anymore or am I just really unhip?)

And to get Jake to send you a love letter, you can go read his post and leave a comment at Zoomdoggle.

Is there something wild and wacky you can do today by mail? What kind of letters can you send out to friends and family and strangers that will make someone smile.

Try at least one today. Just one!

This is how geeky I am. I nearly hopped out of my seat squealing “woo woo woo!” when they had a segment on Good Morning America about gifts you can give people for Christmas if you’re having hard economic times. One of the ideas was writing a letter.

Mellody Hobson mentioned in the segment that she got the idea from Oprah who said that one of the greatest gifts one person can give another is a letter. She also mentioned that once when asked what Oprah would be getting Denzel Washington for Christmas, she said she would be writing him a letter!

So, it’s never been an easier time to simulate the lifestyles of the rich and famous. Forget high fashion, forget upscale homes and cars. Just write a letter!

(Just FYI, the summary of the segment that I have linked to is not nearly as good as the video. She elaborated much more on the letter writing. I’m sorry I couldn’t find a video version of it.)

Here is an interesting article about a teacher who writes seven or eight letters routinely every day. The news story describes her writing habits and her philosophy of letter writing. What a faithful and fascinating pen pal!

http://www.freep.com/article/20081130/TWIST01/811300357/1025/rss05

One of my favorite letters of all time is the letter from Abraham Lincoln to Mrs. Bixby, the mother of five sons who were in the Civil War. You might know this letter from a scene from the movie Saving Private Ryan and handled in such a moving way in the film.

Recently, a copy of the letter was discovered in the archives of a Texas museum and is in the process of being appraised and authenticated. If you want to know more, you can read the whole news story at AOL News. You can read the text of the letter below.

Let’s get back to writing letters like this! How shall we start?

Executive Mansion,
Washington, Nov. 21, 1864.

Dear Madam,–

I have been shown in the files of the War Department a statement of the Adjutant General of Massachusetts that you are the mother of five sons who have died gloriously on the field of battle.

I feel how weak and fruitless must be any word of mine which should attempt to beguile you from the grief of a loss so overwhelming. But I cannot refrain from tendering you the consolation that may be found in the thanks of the Republic they died to save.

I pray that our Heavenly Father may assuage the anguish of your bereavement, and leave you only the cherished memory of the loved and lost, and the solemn pride that must be yours to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of freedom.

Yours, very sincerely and respectfully,

A. Lincoln

Not ten minutes after I posted a link to a love letter writing contest, I ran across a news story about a horrible incident in which a boy was killed for writing a love letter to a girl in his village.

For those of you who live in places where we have the freedom to write who want about what we want, take a moment to appreciate what we sometimes take for granted.