The ‘dying art’ of sending postcards

It’s been a couple of years since we traveled through Arizona’s desolate landscapes and otherworldly formations like the giant meteor crater and the Painted Desert containing the Petrified Forest National Park. I’m remembering I had what then felt like almost a compulsion at every monument to snatch up all the postcards that were of a specific aesthetic, postcards that seem nearly identical to any paused frame in Wes Anderson’s latest film, “Asteroid City,” which is essentially one vintage travel poster after another, sped up to make a moving picture.

As often is the case, my ambitious postcard purchasing can lead to a situation of stalled good intentions ending in a forgotten pile of souvenirs lost in a shoebox rather than sent in the mail.

But this time was different. This time I had someone in mind I wanted to send them to, someone who I hoped would find my interest in the art and design of the postcard itself, as well as the novelty of sending and receiving a postcard as interesting and strangely attractive as I did.

Enter my second-cousin-onceremoved-in-law (?) Jim. Or, as I like to call him, Jim. The fact that Jim is (somehow) related to me is entirely beside the point. When we met, and I was a kid, he was curiosity personified and seemed to know everything there was to know about my favorite subject, geography. We’ve been map pals ever since.

As I recall, I mailed Jim a very “Asteroid City”-esque postcard, and I couldn’t have had him more pegged as a postcard appreciator. What I didn’t expect, but probably should have known, is that he was a connoisseur and practitioner of the postcard tradition leaps and bounds ahead of me. Here’s how I found out.

“I hope you got my postcard,” I messaged him.

“I did! And I replied!” he wrote back. “I have another spectacular postcard to randomly send you one of these days. Ask my daughters, my brother and I like postcards. It’s a dying art, so to speak.”

So there it is, title of show – er –column. When I told him he was the first person I thought of who would appreciate the “dying art” of postcard exchange, he wrote back: “Let’s just do it randomly several times a year!” And so we have. That spectacular postcard he told me about came through, a 5x11inch panorama card of Lake Crescent in Olympic National Park. Spectacular, indeed.

To reciprocate, I sent him three postcards of the the National Shrine of Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton when I was there researching another article a few months ago — a dismembered version of a triptych you’d likely see at a cathedral, with each postcard being one of the panels. A deconstructed panorama, if you will. Only I still had much to learn, forgetting one critical component in my message, as Jim was sure to point out.

“Thanks for the postcard from Emmitsburg, MD,” he messaged me. “At least, I think it was from you. You didn’t sign it.” (Whoops!)

Jim isn’t the only one I send postcards to now. When I first walked onto the island of France’s Mont SaintMichel earlier this summer, one of the first shops I saw wasn’t a shop at all but a post office! It became instantly a matter of priority to find a postcard and send it right then and there to the person I most wished could have been there with me on that trip, my 8-year-old son.

Now in reflection, my own desire to send a memento to someone I thought of with whom I wanted to share that moment of taking in the Abbey on the famed 1,000-year-old tidal island reminds me of a scene from the romantic comedy “French Kiss” that has become part of my family’s quotable quotes over the years. It happens while Meg Ryan’s character is walking through a picturesque street in Paris, and, suddenly swept up by the setting, she interrupts her conversation with Kevin Kline with an observant non-sequitur to proclaim to no one in particular that quintessential postcard sentiment: “Oh! Beautiful! Gorgeous! Wish you were here!”

I’m of the opinion that a postcard is still the best way to say “Oh! Beautiful! Gorgeous! Wish you were here!” to a cherished friend or loved one, since the sending of it is inherently an intentional, inescapable effort of thoughtfulness. The implied message, regardless of what the greeting on the back says, is “I like you, I thought of you, here.” Indeed, I rather think a postcard is the most honest piece of mail there is.

There’s also a certain tactile nostalgia that comes from browsing and selecting a postcard, writing a brief greeting on the back, finding the right priced stamp, and hunting down a place to drop it off to be magically carried across continents and oceans to the object of your attention. A single tangible material via post intended exclusively for an audience of one.

Whereas the selfie in front of a famed landmark or vista posted to social media has a “look at me and where I am” ring to it, a postcard is the antithesis of that: “Look where I was when I thought of you.”

And yet, “I’ve run into a few shop owners on our trip who said they had a hard time finding suppliers, let alone buyers,” cousin Jim tells me in a recent message. “I recall when I was in D.C. several years ago I had difficulty finding postcards, like drug stores didn’t sell them anymore.”

Perhaps postcards — which due to social media, have been languishing in both production and sales in recent years, according to several reports I’ve seen — are the next material culture item ripe for the younger generation of retro hobbyists to breathe life into, the way they’ve done with polaroids, disposable cameras, record players and flip phones, things that represent a mindful slowing down and unplugging from an overconnected and immediate life. To send a postcard is, as they say, a vibe.

For now, the material culture of postcards isn’t something exclusive to the past, as one can still find and send them, but the cultural dominance has certainly waned, with the rise of more bespoke and artful postcards occupying space on the collector’s shelf. But at what point does receiving a postcard from someone become less novel? I find it a singular, joyful surprise every time I receive one, and every time I send one as well.

Jim told me one of his daughters joked that “postcards are our family’s main form of communication.” Something about that just delights me. The precious, finite amount of space to say a mere handful of words removes the burden of having to wax on in the errant assumption of making a communique worth reading. Postcards get right to the point and have a visual aid on the other side to punctuate it. As one recent card Jim sent me from Gatlinburg had written on it: “Joseph, we went to Dollywood. It was great. We have visited TN/NC/SC/GA. Fly home from ATL Tomorrow. Jim.” Perfect.

Just this week, a postcard arrived for me from my wife, who beat the mail home from the business trip she was on when she sent it, thus rendering her “wish you were here!” a little obsolete, kind of like the way it seems postcards are becoming. But I was still charmed by the gesture and realized a moment captured in time and frozen on a

(See POSTCARDS 16)