dead letters: letters to the daughter, and letters to the general

No one ever throws away a letter, or even a postcard. We delete emails, we throw away old tax returns, yellowed copies of divorce decrees and lawsuits. But we keep our letters and postcards. We keep them in folders, in boxes in the garage and attic. Correspondence comprises unspoken personal and family history. Decades, generations, centuries often pass before these letters become part of the weave of our lives, part of what we, and our ancestors, understand about ourselves.

I have always kept every note, postcard, letter, receipt, picture, notecard, essay, school exam, report card-everything that adds up to what is shaping up to have been what was my life.

When my daughter was two years old I began writing letters to her that I intended for her to read when she became an adult. These letters comprise much of this book of correspondence. They’re Dead Letters, never delivered to their recipient.