Usually when we columnists are targeted by a group of letter writers, we can expect grief. Most of the time, the responders want to protest something or other.
They probably feel irate about an opinion that strikes them as outrageous and they want the columnist to get it right or, at least, to suffer from their feedback.

For me, however, it did not work that way last week. The five correspondents ─ two from Texas, one from Arkansas, one from North Carolina, and one from Staten Island ─ all wrote friendly messages in longhand.

As it turns out, they were motivated by a blog called “A Passion for Letter Writing.” Somehow this online site discovered my recent column on letter writing and urged its addicts to let me know they were pleased with it.

They all speak of the intense pleasure they derive from finding a piece of real live correspondence in their mailbox. Needless to say, I added to their pleasure by promptly sending off an appreciative handwritten reply.

It’s gratifying to discover one’s stuff being read far beyond the circulation area of the newspapers that publish me.

Perhaps the most enthusiastic response came from Lisa, one of the Texas correspondents. She writes: “I love everything about letter writing ─ paper, pens, stamps, even the fact that it is unpredictable.”

Wendy, from Arkansas, values letters for the way they bring people together. “I have found it to be so valuable in keeping people close when they are not close at all,” she tells me. “It is simply magic, soul and ink winding across the paper forming a link between two people.”

Committed as I am to letter writing, I cannot equal the overflowing fervor of Lisa and Wendy. They attach an almost mystic importance to the activities and materials that the activity calls for. Much as it pleases me to send and receive letters, most of them do not thrill me to that extent.

Some letters, however, are truly exciting, especially those that have been written by ancestors and passed down over centuries.

Last week, I talked with an 85-year-old woman whose grandfather was a soldier in the Civil War, on the Confederate side. My inquiries about his letters produced the dismaying answer that they were no longer in her hands. I could have wept.

Carla, another Texan, refers to letters written by a long-gone relative on a. journey. “I do have transcripts of letters in which my great-great-great-grandmother apologized for her poor penmanship because of the bumpy wagon train.”

Striking another theme, Carla speaks of the effect that letter writing can have on one’s interior life. She refers to “the peace and calm that can come over one when sitting to write a letter.”

When you write in this frame of mind, she suggests, you benefit from a kind of spirituality that helps to orient one’s life toward important values. That helps explain why so many saints throughout history have written letters that are prized by people who care about the spiritual life.

Sometimes I wonder if the days of letter carriers coming to homes are numbered. When I see those who deliver our mail coping with obstacles like icy front walks and angry dogs, I reflect how much easier it would be for all mail to be delivered electronically.

But that would be to deprive people of the physical and psychological satisfactions that come with daily delivery. My correspondents all speak of the pleasure they get in looking forward to, and ultimately finding, each day’s mail.

“You never know what’s going to show up in your mail box,” writes Andrea of Staten Island. “Real mail is best,” she adds for unbelievers everywhere.

In my household, the question that we ask each other after one of us fetches the mail from the porch is “Anything personal?” That’s what we crave ─ not solicitations from businesses or bills that demand payment (they could reasonably be sent by email), but words written to and for us.

This is what we open first or sometimes, to make the pleasure more delicious, last. All the fabulous letters I have received over the mounting decades of my life form an archive of people who have been important to me.

The prospect of throwing them away stirs resistance in my soul. Even though they contribute to the irredeemably messy environment of my office, I will rebuff proposals to pitch them.

You may be too rational to feel sympathy for this breach of good order. However, I know that I can now count on the support of at least five people scattered around the country.

These are the hardy defenders of the time-tested worth of the good old letter. From devoted practice they know how much these personal documents add to the value of human life.

May they continue in their defense of this habit and may they persuade more people to join their ranks.

Richard Griffin