It’s all in the cards

I send out post cards a lot. If the truth be known, I am not the world's greatest letter writer, but I may be one the world's greatest post card writers.

When I traveled to Australia a few years ago, I sent a post card to every family in the church. I did the same when I studied briefly in Ireland, and I sent every family a post card from the Virgin Islands. I have sent post cards from San Antonio, Florida, Pittsburgh and other locations where I have stayed a week or more. I enjoy doing it, and the people at church seem to get a kick out of it as well.

It all started in Colorado in early 1981. I accepted a staff position with a church in Grand Junction, Colo., and, the day after Christmas in 1980, we loaded up the truck, the two kids, our furniture, and my pregnant wife and headed across the country. I wasn't sure when I would be back in Tennessee and didn't know when I would see my family again, so I began sending post cards. I sent them to my grandmother (Mom's mom), to my Granny (Dad's mom), and to Elsie (my wife's grandmother on her Dad's side). The grandmothers received at least one post card a week. My mom and dad, however, received from 3 to 6 postcards a week.

The great beauty of post cards is that one can send photographs of where one is living or is traveling. It's like a mini-travelogue. The other beauty of post cards is that one need only write two to four sentences before one runs out of room. So, not being a letter writer, I mailed out postcards. Even after leaving Colorado in 1983 and arriving in Georgia, I continued to send post cards. If I visited another state, or even another part of the state, I collected post cards to send to parents and grandmothers.

I did write some letters, and I did send photographs of the kids back home, especially to my parents. Sometimes, I would just put photographs in envelopes and mail them without a letter, thinking that, being grandparents, my folks would rather get photos of the kids rather than hear from me anyway. And, of course, we sent birthday cards, anniversary cards, and Christmas cards. Over the years, I sent between 3,432 and 6,864 postcards to my mom and dad, about 100 Hallmark-style cards, and hundreds of photographs. When we moved to Georgia, I called them from time to time and visited a few times a year, but I kept the mail hot with post cards and photos. The reason that I know how many cards and photos I sent is that my mother kept them all.

Kathleen Luster Epps, my mom, died two years ago yesterday. In the weeks that followed, my brother and I had to go through every box and drawer, and that is how I discovered the boxes and boxes of cards and photos that she carefully put away after receiving them. I didn't keep the Hallmark-style cards, but I did bring the photos and the postcards home with me. One day, I suppose I will go through them and re-live the travels, adventures, and mundane experiences shared on 2-4 lines on the back of each post card.

I wish I had called a little more often. Actually I wish I had called every few days to check on her, especially after September 1996 when Dad died. I wish I had visited more often, and I wish I had stayed for a few days each time instead of just overnight. My wife told me I need to call and visit more often. As always, she was right.

I really didn't realize that my moving the family out of east Tennessee would affect my mom so profoundly, but it did. I think she expected that both her sons and all her grandchildren would live within a few minutes of her, as had been the case in her own family. I don't know that I could have changed that, since church jobs don't grow on trees in east Tennessee, but I still wish I had heard her voice more often and that I had seen her face more frequently, especially in the last few years.

Still, I was pleased and surprised that she kept the postcards, stored in boxes under every bed. I'd like to think that she knew that I was missing her and thinking of her every single day that I was away. And, although I can no longer send her a post card, I'd like to think that, during these last two years, that, somehow, she knows that hardly a day has passed when I haven't looked at her picture, or thought about her, or missed her. When my mom died, there was an incredible ache left. And, while I have wiped my tears away and have moved on with life and all its busyness, that ache is with me still. I'd give hundreds of photos and 6,864 postcards to have her back just one more day.