MAIL CALL
The mail has been a way of communication for as long as anyone can remember. Just this morning I read in 2nd Chronicles, Chapter 30, Verse 1 where “…Hezekiah sent to all Israel and Judah, and wrote letters also to Ephraim and Manasseh, …”. So mail has been going on at least that long.
The early Pioneers would send mail via any rider who was leaving their camp back to family in Nauvoo, or other points east. It was via the mail that the Apostles serving on missions in England and other areas during the early days of the Church, learned that the Prophet Joseph Smith and Hyrum Smith had been martyred.
I remember in my life that mail played an important part. When I was just 10 years old my family had moved to Dallas from San Jose and I would get letters from my friends whom I had left in San Jose. Later, after we moved back to California and my parents had been divorced, I would get letters from my Dad … and those were the best kind because they usually had money in them (okay, I’m cheap). Other times in my life followed where letters became very important to me.
Mail is an important part of every Missionary's life … and I imagine that is true for those missionaries other than LDS Missionaries. As a young missionary serving in the New England and Eastern States Missions, this was true for me. Mission rules allowed us to receive mail from home only once a week, so we looked forward to that day our letters would arrive. Unlike some Missions today where mail goes thru the Mission Home, our mail came directly to us at our apartment. I remember that I would get so excited to get a letter from my mother and sister. I would get letters from my aunts as well. Of course, there was a young lady who would write to me each week, and I was always looking forward to her letters more than any others. I even looked forward to letters from my ex-girlfriend who apparently had decided that I wasn’t all that bad, and as long as I wrote back to her, she considered me “her Missionary”, a status symbol among young LDS girls.
Later, as I was serving in the United States Army, mail became very important in my daily life. During basic training at Fort Ord we had Mail Call once a week. The drill sergeant or one of the cadre would bring up a sack of mail one evening after training and call out names as he read the soldiers name on the envelope. I really looked forward to those letters from home, and especially the ones in the pastel colored envelopes sprayed with perfume from my new bride of only six months. Those letters were very special to me, and I measured my weeks in basic by the day we had mail call.
Later in Viet Nam, mail call became even more important. It wasn’t just once a week and the Sergeant didn’t come into the billets with a huge sack of mail. The unit mail clerk picked up the mail from the APO (Army Post Office) and then just went around the unit distributing mail. I remember vividly getting off of shift in the radar van and finding a letter or letters on my bunk. Again, the letters in the perfumed pastel envelopes were my favorite! Often there were packages on my bunk; we called them CARE PACKAGES. Care packages were fun to get and usually were packed with goodies. Once I got a care package from some friends who were stationed in Germany. Ramona had baked me a carrot cake and sent it to me in Viet Nam. In 1970 there was no FedEx, and it took nearly a month for the cake to get to me. This was not unusual as it took more than a week for just a letter to get from California to Viet Nam, so imagine a package going from an APO in Germany to an APO in Viet Nam, then to a small unit in a Podunk outpost along the Cambodian border in the jungles of South Viet Nam. Well, the cake was green! I sent a thank you letter to Ramona and Rich, but I don’t believe I told them the condition of the cake. It was, after all, the fact they cared enough for me to make the effort to send a cake half way around the world that was more important than the condition of the cake.
I had the same experiences while stationed in South Korea. Letters were very important, and I looked forward to going to the CMR (Consolidated Mail Room) and getting my perfumed pastel envelopes from my post box. I also got letters from my children that were very special to me as well.
For the last few days I have been giving this subject of letters some thought. It started last Wednesday evening as I got home from work and found an envelope in my mail box addressed to me. Now, I was expecting this as Jannie had told that I had received my new Check Card and she was sending it to me. So when I pulled out the manila envelope, I was not surprised that I could feel the credit card. But, at the same time, as I looked at that envelope, for a brief moment I had the same feeling that I got every time in my life when I found a perfumed pastel envelope on my bunk or in the post box at the CMR. I was almost disappointed then all that fell out of the envelope was my credit card!
I feel kind of sorry for those who have come up in this current generation. With emails and text messaging being so easy and convenient, we never send letters anymore. Even at holidays like Christmas and Easter; or on special occasions such as birthdays and anniversaries, we send electronic cards when we used to send cards that we spent hours in the Hallmark store looking to find the one that said just the right thing. We simply send the correspondence electronically; and when we receive one, we read it and then hit the delete button so our in-boxes don’t become cluttered. The young people of today’s time may never have the experience of reading a letter, setting it aside, and then rereading it again and again. They may never have the chance to find a box of letters from their sweetheart that they have collected over the years and sit down on a rainy afternoon and just reread them and laugh and cry all over again. Even the young missionaries go to the library on P-day to check their emails from home. Just seems so cold to me. I guess those days of letters are gone and an old man just sits at his computer on a Saturday morning in Tooele, Utah, working on his blog so he can post it and not have to send it out individually to every one in his address book. Even I am a victim of technology.
The mail has been a way of communication for as long as anyone can remember. Just this morning I read in 2nd Chronicles, Chapter 30, Verse 1 where “…Hezekiah sent to all Israel and Judah, and wrote letters also to Ephraim and Manasseh, …”. So mail has been going on at least that long.
The early Pioneers would send mail via any rider who was leaving their camp back to family in Nauvoo, or other points east. It was via the mail that the Apostles serving on missions in England and other areas during the early days of the Church, learned that the Prophet Joseph Smith and Hyrum Smith had been martyred.
I remember in my life that mail played an important part. When I was just 10 years old my family had moved to Dallas from San Jose and I would get letters from my friends whom I had left in San Jose. Later, after we moved back to California and my parents had been divorced, I would get letters from my Dad … and those were the best kind because they usually had money in them (okay, I’m cheap). Other times in my life followed where letters became very important to me.
Mail is an important part of every Missionary's life … and I imagine that is true for those missionaries other than LDS Missionaries. As a young missionary serving in the New England and Eastern States Missions, this was true for me. Mission rules allowed us to receive mail from home only once a week, so we looked forward to that day our letters would arrive. Unlike some Missions today where mail goes thru the Mission Home, our mail came directly to us at our apartment. I remember that I would get so excited to get a letter from my mother and sister. I would get letters from my aunts as well. Of course, there was a young lady who would write to me each week, and I was always looking forward to her letters more than any others. I even looked forward to letters from my ex-girlfriend who apparently had decided that I wasn’t all that bad, and as long as I wrote back to her, she considered me “her Missionary”, a status symbol among young LDS girls.
Later, as I was serving in the United States Army, mail became very important in my daily life. During basic training at Fort Ord we had Mail Call once a week. The drill sergeant or one of the cadre would bring up a sack of mail one evening after training and call out names as he read the soldiers name on the envelope. I really looked forward to those letters from home, and especially the ones in the pastel colored envelopes sprayed with perfume from my new bride of only six months. Those letters were very special to me, and I measured my weeks in basic by the day we had mail call.
Later in Viet Nam, mail call became even more important. It wasn’t just once a week and the Sergeant didn’t come into the billets with a huge sack of mail. The unit mail clerk picked up the mail from the APO (Army Post Office) and then just went around the unit distributing mail. I remember vividly getting off of shift in the radar van and finding a letter or letters on my bunk. Again, the letters in the perfumed pastel envelopes were my favorite! Often there were packages on my bunk; we called them CARE PACKAGES. Care packages were fun to get and usually were packed with goodies. Once I got a care package from some friends who were stationed in Germany. Ramona had baked me a carrot cake and sent it to me in Viet Nam. In 1970 there was no FedEx, and it took nearly a month for the cake to get to me. This was not unusual as it took more than a week for just a letter to get from California to Viet Nam, so imagine a package going from an APO in Germany to an APO in Viet Nam, then to a small unit in a Podunk outpost along the Cambodian border in the jungles of South Viet Nam. Well, the cake was green! I sent a thank you letter to Ramona and Rich, but I don’t believe I told them the condition of the cake. It was, after all, the fact they cared enough for me to make the effort to send a cake half way around the world that was more important than the condition of the cake.
I had the same experiences while stationed in South Korea. Letters were very important, and I looked forward to going to the CMR (Consolidated Mail Room) and getting my perfumed pastel envelopes from my post box. I also got letters from my children that were very special to me as well.
For the last few days I have been giving this subject of letters some thought. It started last Wednesday evening as I got home from work and found an envelope in my mail box addressed to me. Now, I was expecting this as Jannie had told that I had received my new Check Card and she was sending it to me. So when I pulled out the manila envelope, I was not surprised that I could feel the credit card. But, at the same time, as I looked at that envelope, for a brief moment I had the same feeling that I got every time in my life when I found a perfumed pastel envelope on my bunk or in the post box at the CMR. I was almost disappointed then all that fell out of the envelope was my credit card!
I feel kind of sorry for those who have come up in this current generation. With emails and text messaging being so easy and convenient, we never send letters anymore. Even at holidays like Christmas and Easter; or on special occasions such as birthdays and anniversaries, we send electronic cards when we used to send cards that we spent hours in the Hallmark store looking to find the one that said just the right thing. We simply send the correspondence electronically; and when we receive one, we read it and then hit the delete button so our in-boxes don’t become cluttered. The young people of today’s time may never have the experience of reading a letter, setting it aside, and then rereading it again and again. They may never have the chance to find a box of letters from their sweetheart that they have collected over the years and sit down on a rainy afternoon and just reread them and laugh and cry all over again. Even the young missionaries go to the library on P-day to check their emails from home. Just seems so cold to me. I guess those days of letters are gone and an old man just sits at his computer on a Saturday morning in Tooele, Utah, working on his blog so he can post it and not have to send it out individually to every one in his address book. Even I am a victim of technology.
