Another cloudy day with occasional showers. I woke up at half past seven, posted the Morning Prayer YouTube link to WhatsApp, listened to Thought for the Day, and fell asleep again until ten to nine. It's getting to be a habit.
I went to the Eucharist at St John's. There were five of us with Meg who celebrated. I went to Tesco's afterwards to get our foodbank donation and then returned and had coffee before returning home. I had some last minute edits to make on Sway, then more material came in, so I was again late starting to cook lunch, but Sway was ready to send at two, the usual deadline.
When I started Mailchimp, it asked me to verify my login with a pass code via SMS or email. The last time I had to do this was at the end of August. I have no access to the email account or the mobile phone the passcode is destined for, so I sent a message to Rachel who has admin rights over these accounts, and just had to wait for a response and an opportunity to agree a time when this info can be transmitted. Why it should happen now I have no idea.
I went for a walk in the park and returned at five to rendezvous with Rachel in order to get the Mailchimp security passcode from her. After gaining access to the account, the matter of updating the mailing list and sending out this week's Sway link was completed very quickly, much to my relief. Then I was free to work on assembling the annual letter and Christmas card to about forty people. Label printing first, then supper and later in the evening, an hour of envelope stuffing and stamp mounting. Clare had already sent another dozen with parcels and letters.
Tomorrow I'll see to the digital mail-out of the letter and greetings to another forty recipients in distant places. This year's postage bill for parcels and letters was over seventy quid. It's not only inflation pushing up the cost, but the huge drop in ordinary postal traffic due to the rise in digital greeting cards and emails, driving up the sending price per unit because staff numbers and equipment required are much the same, whether the revenue from postage rises or falls.
When I look at today's mailing list compared to when I retired thirteen years ago, it's amazing to think how many former recipients, friends, family, acquaintances, colleagues have died, or are lost contact with for other reasons. The stream of life flows own. We go with it, but will eventually get left behind. It's fifty five years since I sent out copies of our newsletter while I was training in St Mike's, and have continued to do so ever since. Why bother? It's simple really. Telling our family story to any who might be interested in our life together is to my mind part of the bedrock of our identity. I wonder how many recipients down the years kept copies tucked away somewhere. I know I didn't, until I started using and storing things on a computer. back in the late 1980s. I've not yet trawled through my archives to see how many I can find. Perhaps one day I'll get around it. Right now it's time for bed,
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