Even in our digital age, some people still cherish the act of writing handwritten letters. These letters carry sentiments of thoughtfulness, nostalgia, and connection, maintaining their unique and timeless charm. Recently, Mike, known on Reddit as u/g3tyasum, shared a heartwarming letter he received from his mailman, who announced his retirement and sent a kind note to his customers.
Representative Image Source: Pexels I Photo by Ron Lach
Mike found the letter in his mailbox and shared it on Reddit with the caption, "For as long as I have lived in my house, always thought the Mailman was very nice. He put this in the mailbox. Reminds me that there are good warm people in all walks of life." The mailman has been identified as Michael Raymen, who after serving the US Postal Service for more than 20 years has now called time on his career. Before his last delivery, the man wrote his customers a sweet handwritten note saying goodbye and thank you.
Image Source: A United States Postal Service logo is displayed on a U.S. Post Office mailbox on April 1, 2024, in Montclair, California. (Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images)
The letter starts with a friendly tone, "Hi, Mike, the mailman here." In the opening paragraph, he declares, "It is with a heavy heart that I announce my retirement from the US Postal Service. Twenty years have seemingly flown by. It has been a privilege and a pleasure to have been your letter carrier for the past four years. Many of you have been with me that long, some have not."
Representative Image Source: US Postal Service letter carrier Dennis Stecz delivers mail on January 28, 2009, in San Lorenzo, California. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)
As the letter progresses, Michael expresses his thoughts about his customers. "I have enjoyed getting to know you and hope that I have provided a service to your liking. I have seen many changes over the years and have enjoyed and endured all of the triumphs and heartaches. I will miss all of you as you have seemed like a second family to me," he wrote.
In the last stanza of the note, he mentions his late wife and how she would have seconded his decision saying "I lost my wife of 42 years in Sept. 2014, but I know she would agree that it is time to close this chapter and start a new one." He ends the letter by addressing his last day of work, "My last day will be Sept. 30, 2015. I do sincerely wish you and yours, all the best." The response to the Reddit post has been enormous as it has received over 30,000 upvotes. Users have expressed their heartfelt wishes to the mailman and have appreciated his gesture towards his customers.
One user, u/HorseAFC, complimented the mailman for his handwriting, "That mailman has the best handwriting I've ever seen." In reply to the comment, another user, u/redlinezo6, pointed out, "It got a little wobbly when he mentioned his wife."
Image Source: Reddit I u/faded_jester
Image Source: Reddit I u/smithrjames
Some users even suggested Mike do something good in return for the mailman. u/boredwithyou suggested, "A nice card/ letter with a tip or gift card would be great to give this guy. He clearly loved his job and is moving on to a new chapter of his life." Another user, u/saltinado, wrote, "You need to go and deliver some cookies and a nice note into his mailbox." The OP replied to all the positive comments and wrote, "Wow. Just woke up...top of the front page. I don't even know where to start...I will try and get in contact with Mike, and try to set something up like most people asked. I'll also tell him just how many lives he's touched by one letter." He added that he "personally wrote a letter for him" and also worked on "starting up a fundraiser" for him.
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Will your current friends still be with you after seven years?
Professor shares how many years a friendship must last before it'll become lifelong
Think of your best friend. How long have you known them? Growing up, children make friends and say they’ll be best friends forever. That’s where “BFF” came from, for crying out loud. But is the concept of the lifelong friend real? If so, how many years of friendship will have to bloom before a friendship goes the distance? Well, a Dutch study may have the answer to that last question.
Sociologist Gerald Mollenhorst and his team in the Netherlands did extensive research on friendships and made some interesting findings in his surveys and studies. Mollenhorst found that over half of your friendships will “shed” within seven years. However, the relationships that go past the seven-year mark tend to last. This led to the prevailing theory that most friendships lasting more than seven years would endure throughout a person’s lifetime.
In Mollenhorst’s findings, lifelong friendships seem to come down to one thing: reciprocal effort. The primary reason so many friendships form and fade within seven-year cycles has much to do with a person’s ages and life stages. A lot of people lose touch with elementary and high school friends because so many leave home to attend college. Work friends change when someone gets promoted or finds a better job in a different state. Some friends get married and have children, reducing one-on-one time together, and thus a friendship fades. It’s easy to lose friends, but naturally harder to keep them when you’re no longer in proximity.
Some people on Reddit even wonder if lifelong friendships are actually real or just a romanticized thought nowadays. However, older commenters showed that lifelong friendship is still possible:
“I met my friend on the first day of kindergarten. Maybe not the very first day, but within the first week. We were texting each other stupid memes just yesterday. This year we’ll both celebrate our 58th birthdays.”
“My oldest friend and I met when she was just 5 and I was 9. Next-door neighbors. We're now both over 60 and still talk weekly and visit at least twice a year.”
“I’m 55. I’ve just spent a weekend with friends I met 24 and 32 years ago respectively. I’m also still in touch with my penpal in the States. I was 15 when we started writing to each other.”
“My friends (3 of them) go back to my college days in my 20’s that I still talk to a minimum of once a week. I'm in my early 60s now.”
“We ebb and flow. Sometimes many years will pass as we go through different things and phases. Nobody gets buttsore if we aren’t in touch all the time. In our 50s we don’t try and argue or be petty like we did before. But I love them. I don’t need a weekly lunch to know that. I could make a call right now if I needed something. Same with them.”
Maintaining a friendship for life is never guaranteed, but there are ways, psychotherapists say, that can make a friendship last. It’s not easy, but for a friendship to last, both participants need to make room for patience and place greater weight on their similarities than on the differences that may develop over time. Along with that, it’s helpful to be tolerant of large distances and gaps of time between visits, too. It’s not easy, and it requires both people involved to be equally invested to keep the friendship alive and from becoming stagnant.
As tough as it sounds, it is still possible. You may be a fortunate person who can name several friends you’ve kept for over seven years or over seventy years. But if you’re not, every new friendship you make has the same chance and potential of being lifelong.