Cards of Kindness

Look, I am not naïve enough to think that a little kindness can put a dent in solving what is happening in our country right now.  It feels as if the world is on fire and no amount of kindness can put it out at this point.  Only equality and justice can begin to right these wrongs. 

But today is the first time in over a week that I have been able to focus.  It is the first time I have been able to think of action instead of anger.  Of fighting instead of crying.  So, I thought maybe a tiny dose of kindness was in order and that it might shine a little candlelight in this dark world.

This is a kind act done by a Facebook friend of mine, Katie.  I have met her a couple of times in person, she and I are both interpreters (American Sign Language/English), but mostly we know each other from social media.  A while back she messaged me and ask for my mailing address.  She said she wanted to send me a “Covid Card”.  Curious (and a lover of mail), I replied with my address.

Katie and her dog Collins ("Rent" fans will recognize that name!)

Fast forward a couple of weeks and I found THIS in my mail!!!!

Isn’t it fabulous????  It brightened my day so much!  I asked Katie if I could write about her project here, in the hopes that it might inspire someone else to do something as cool as she did.  Here’s what she told me.

“I love mailing and receiving cards and letters. It can connect you with people you’d never imagine connecting with. I have been struggling with my anxiety and mental illness since the stay at home orders began a couple months ago. I thought it would be helpful for me, and hopefully others, if I were to reach out on an individual level to the people in my life.”

Ok, yeah Katie.  I adore mail.  Like, I literally used to walk down 3 or 4 flights of stairs twice a day just to check and see if I had any mail (and I rarely did).  But that doesn’t mean I thought, “Hey, Susan, why don’t you mail out over 500 Covid cards to people….”.  Yes – you read that right.  She sent out over 500 cards!!  She said she sent 503, but with the stragglers the total will be closer to 505 or 510.  She sent them all over America (Alaska, New York, California, New Mexico, Texas, Louisiana, and all around the east coast). A few lucky people in in England, Ireland, and Australia got them, too!

A playful side of Katie at Niagara Falls

Katie likes to send cards to her friends and family for their birthdays, so this project sort of grew out of that.  She was writing out the birthday cards for March and April, then, “…I remembered how fun it is (to send cards) and how much I enjoy it. I also happened to find a BUNCH of stamps and friendship cards just that month, so I had a lot to get started on without much investment up front. It began as mainly the people I write to on their birthdays. I enjoyed it so much and people were responding SO kindly to the idea, I reached out to as many people as I could on Facebook. I’ve reconnected with a ton of people from my high school!”.

Of course I asked Katie the obvious question, WHY DID SHE DO THIS GRAND GESTURE??  “Partially for my own mental health, but more so for those around me. I thought about doing it for strangers, but the closest I got to that was making one for each person in my apartment building; I don’t know all of those people very well. But I’ve realized what I was really looking for was connections through kindness.”  That’s profound…  And, in the end, I think it is what all of us are looking for – connections through kindness. 

One thing I so admire about Katie is her honesty about mental health.  She doesn’t cloak her mental illness, she talks about it.  Her diagnoses are Bipolar 2 and ADHD.  I think openness like hers is so needed.  If more people were willing to be frank, there would be no stigma attached to mental illness.  When I asked her how she has been doing during Covid 19 she said, “To be honest, not that great. I’ve had a number of mental and physical side effects due to the increased anxiety and stress from being quarantined. My psychiatrist has had to change my meds, which did help, but I’m extremely extroverted, so I need those connections to be more present in my life.”  Isn’t it great that she found a way to make those connections without endangering her health??  US Postal Service to the rescue!!!

The newest Kindness Activist - Katie

But gestures this grand don’t come free….  So, how much DID she spend??  “Oh gosh, I’ve honestly been trying NOT to calculate it, because I’m afraid it’s a good bit, and I haven’t been able to work (the unemployment office thinks it’s paying me, but they haven’t started my payments from when I set it up in April!). But it’s $0.59 per stamp, and in averaging out the MANY sets of greeting cards I had, I maybe spent $1-$2 on each card for each person. So, that’s like almost $800. But as I mentioned, I found a bunch of cards and stamps for probably close to 100 people, so I (hopefully) spent less than that.”

“For my next project,” Katie told me, “I’m going to frame all the cards I’ve received in return and put them on my bedroom wall to remember that there are lots of people out there that I’ve had an impact on.”  Well Katie, my return card (which will include your official Kindness Activist pin and a donation for stamps) will be mailed soon!!!  Thank you for being a source of KINDNESS in the world.

And to everyone else reading, let’s take a tip from Katie.  Maybe we won’t mail 500 cards, but even 3 or 4 would brighten people’s days.  And we all need a bit of kindness these days.