No. 20 -- Write a hand-written letter each month and mail it.

Whoooo will get the first hand-written letter?

Sorry, I couldn't help myself.

Why it's on the list: Because there is something about a hand-written letter. The fact that it is pretty-much extinct? Maybe that's it. It's like an art form. I'm like a.... "thinker" if I write a hand-written letter. I must have something to say, if I write a hand-written letter. I am deep and philosophical and witty. OK, I'm being a little silly. But the bottom line isn't that far off. I think it's nice. To think of someone and sit down and clear your head and put some thoughts down and then to mail it. It's formal but intimate. You can keep a letter and reread it. And it's hard! We don't know how to write letters anymore. Our communications are so instant, so shallow and so constant, that when we're forced to be a little more long-winded, thoughtful and soul-bearing, it's, for me at least, a very unfamiliar, unnatural act. I'd like to be better at it. I'd like someone to keep one of my letters, pull it out years from now and smile. They say if you want to be good at something, to practice it. So here I go.

How I'll do it: I'm going to make a list of people who I think should get a letter. I'll review it and pick someone each month. I can change the list up at any time, but I hope having the list made will make me think of little things -- randomly, in the shower, while I'm driving -- to write in my letters. Then I'll pour a cup of something warm and sit down to write. I'm going to try to make those letters more than just drivel I spew out at the last minute. In full honesty, my first letter, written Saturday and to be mailed tomorrow, wasn't far off from that. Hopefully, as we go along, it won't be so hard to figure out something to say that is worthy of a hand-written note! Especially ones written on sweet stationary like this one was...