I dropped the envelope into the mailbox. Once a week for nine years I’d sent a letter to my aunt Amelia.
Most people thought Amelia was a spinster but she’d been married one day when she was nineteen. Her husband had held up a store the day before their wedding and he was arrested on their wedding night. Amelia had inherited a house from her father and she put her house up to bail him out of jail and he ran away never to be seen again. She’d lost her husband of only a few hours and she’d lost her house. She was small and shy and reminded people of a little sparrow, she always looked a bit frightened as if you spoke too loudly she might fly away.
One Christmas I had an extra Christmas card and hated to waste it so I decided to send it to Amelia even though we weren’t really close and had never exchanged Christmas cards before.
A week after Christmas I received a letter from her thanking me. She said she hadn’t received a Christmas card in years and she taped it to her refrigerator door where she could see it every day.
I realized for the first time how lonely she must be. I’d never spent much time with her and I lived in another state so I only saw her every few years.
I decided I’d start sending a letter once a week just for a while. I didn’t know I’d be doing it for nine years or that I’d be sending over four hundred cards and letters to her.
Since my own life is busy but not exciting, I’d try to make my letters more interesting by including jokes, recipes, newspaper clippings, pressed flowers, autumn leaves, anything I could think of to entertain her.
As time went by she became more house bound, partly because of her health but mostly because she had become fearful. The world seemed like a dangerous place to her. Whenever I’d think about not writing or skipping a week, I’d picture her sitting in her chair by the window watching and waiting for the mailman to deliver a letter. I’d only planned to write to her for a few months but I’d made a lifelong commitment.
In January, Amelia called and said she had fallen down her stairs and broken her ankle and needed someone to stay with her just for a few days but if I was too busy she’d understand. I told her I’d be there as soon as possible and would stay as long as she needed me.
When I arrived, Amelia was in a wheelchair and looked even worse than I’d expected. She kept apologizing for bothering me and I told her she was no trouble at all; I had all the time in the world and was looking forward to a really good visit.
She told me to put my things in the East bedroom because it got the most sun and was the most cheerful room.
I took my bag upstairs and hung my clothes in the closet. I was going to put the rest of my clothes in the old dresser but when I pulled open the top drawer it was full of envelopes in neat rows. I closed the top drawer and opened the next and the next. Every drawer was filled. I pulled out an envelope and saw my own handwriting. I looked at the date; it was a letter I’d sent to Aunt Amelia six years ago. I looked through the drawers and found every letter and card I’d sent her for the past nine years, she’d saved them all, there were over four hundred. There was no mail from anyone else, just me.
I closed the drawers and left the rest of my clothes in my suitcase and I sat on the bed and cried.
I thought I was being kind to her by writing to her every week but what she had done was overwhelming. She’d treasured each and every letter and saved them for years like they were the most valuable thing she owned. Because the letters were special to her, that made me special. I felt important, loved and valued. I’d never felt so needed or so appreciated. I mattered, what I did mattered, my letters mattered.
Her gesture was probably the most loving, tender thing anyone had ever done for me and if I hadn’t come to stay with her I’d have never known how much my letters meant to her. I might not be important to anyone else in the world but I was the most important person in Amelia’s world.
I stayed with her until she got the cast removed. I cleaned her house, cooked and took care of her. We played Monopoly and worked puzzles and watched old movies on TV.
She mentioned her husband for the first time. She said he was beautiful, the most handsome man she’d ever seen. She said nobody understood why such a handsome man would want her because she was so plain but she’d felt like the luckiest woman in the world. He was handsome and charming but he was weak and he couldn’t face his problems so he’d run away. She hadn’t heard from him in over fifty years. She didn’t sound bitter or angry, only sad that he’d left her. I had the feeling if he knocked on her door today she’d forgive him and take him back. Amelia was incapable of holding a grudge or being angry.
When I left I promised I’d visit her more often and she asked if that meant I wasn’t going to write to her anymore. I said no and that I’d always write to her once a week.
“Always?” she asked.
“Always, I promise,” I said.
I’m still writing to her and I know she’s still saving my letters.
If I was kind to write to her, her kindness was so much greater because she made my ordinary letters into a priceless treasure.
The small things we do matter a great deal to someone.
Crying Wind is the author of Crying Wind and My Searching Heart, When the Stars Danced, and Thunder in Our Hearts, Lightning in Our Veins. All her books are available from Indian Life.
