Normally, I would not be blogging about an article I’ve written that was published elsewhere which could just as well have been, well, a blog.  But, here I am doing just that, in reaction to the reaction to my op-ed published in The New York Times on Oct. 1:  https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/29/opinion/stamp-collecting-philately.html?_r=0

You will note that it has nothing to do with Trump, North Korea, gun violence or natural disasters. For that reason alone, I thought it would resonate with readers—and it did—because, as I told my editor: A weary nation cries out for relief. “There are a lot of things in the news these days that make me want to cry,” one reader wrote to me. “This op-ed actually drew tears. I found it to be one of the saddest things I’ve read in a long time, and it made me feel incredibly old.”

My peg was simple enough:  In a very modest attempt to begin cleaning out the detritus of a life, I gave away my stamp collection. To a good cause, I might add, a veterans group that sends stamps to VA hospitals and residences around the country.  In one sense, the piece was about what we keep and what we leave behind.

In a larger sense, the op-ed was about how society, communication and the pace of life have changed, and about what we have lost in the rush to rush, to always be “on” and ready to click on the send button rather than to pause and reflect and then express our thoughts in more than 140 characters or with a Facebook emoji.

One of my colleagues said the column brought to mind a conversation she’d had 20 years ago with her longtime local mail carrier. “He told me that when he began his career with the post office, he felt that he was doing a service crucial to people’s lives, bringing the most important information they needed. Every April, he said, the high school seniors would be waiting for him at their mail boxes and when the fat envelope arrived, some would hug and kiss him as if he were the one who had made their dream come true. But no more. The importance is gone.”

Another correspondent tried to sell what he thought was his “million-dollar stamp collection” to a dealer, who expressed almost no interest. The writer managed to unload his collection a few years later to “an unsuspecting soul.” Still, he continues to “mourn the loss.”

Mary Snyder also had given up her “childish fascination with beautiful stamps” but now insists on sending snail mail, “topping it off with special stamps” she hopes will ignite or reignite the recipient’s interest in “mail magic.”  She speaks of “Snail Mail Art” as a new fad. Perhaps.

A woman in Baltimore described herself as a stamp enthusiast but not a collector. She makes a point of sending “physical mail to friends and relatives with interesting stamps for postage.”  From yet another reader: “Do you think our young people today could be patient enough to wait for new issues and save them in books?”  Sadly, the question seems almost rhetorical.

Steven Shavell, a Harvard Law School professor in his early 70s, wrote that although he’d lost interest in stamps, he still has and treasures his collection, “maybe because it brings back pleasant memories of youth. In any event…my children couldn’t care less about my collection and will probably discard it when I expire.” Another man, 62, recalled his youthful stamp collecting days and still has his “Worldwide Stamp Album.” He can “open to one of my favorite pages and be transported back in time; what was once a window on the world is now a window on my life. I won’t get rid of my stamps, and I don’t care if they have little market value. Rather, I’m happy to know, now, that there’s no financial incentive to sell them—excellent!”

All these heartfelt, wistful responses, and in today’s mail came this, a 9-by-12-inch white envelope emblazoned with various denominations of commemorative stamps, including a plate block of four 4-cent stamps marking the centennial of the 1858 Lincoln-Douglas debates. Inside, I found a note from the sender, Raymond C. Yee, of Hoffman Estates, Illinois. “Dear Mr. Meyer – Thank you for your letter to the NY Times.  I know exactly how you feel.  Ray.” No, thank you, Ray.

Well, time for some full disclosure:  After writing the op-ed, I discovered another stamp album that wasn’t in the box of albums I’d donated and not one I had personally curated. On a basement book shelf and protected by plain brown wrapping paper, it once belonged to Junior Plummer, 5011 North 30th St., Omaha, Nebraska, according to what I found handwritten inside the cover.

Published in 1933, the album contains many blank pages but quite a few with stamps from the 1860’s to the 1930’s. They are from all over the world, including colonies that are now countries and countries that no longer exist.  It is a window on 70 years of history, geography and rulers of nations whose images are boldly printed. The album weighs a ton. Whatever its monetary value, or more likely, it’s lack thereof, I think I’ll keep it—at least for now.