Mail Lenka

Dear Michelle,

The letter I wasn't able to put in the mail for lack of an address would contain:

2 pieces
Naked Unreal
4_nakedUnreal-101_karendeLuna.jpg
4_nakedUnreal-218_karendeLuna.jpg

1 URL
https://youtu.be/eE9tV1WGTgE

1 verse
As weird as slime mold,
As rich as black gold

1 extra credit
Manila Elk
4_manilaElk.jpg

and perhaps a map connecting anagrams and broken homes

xo - karen.

True Mail 
by Michelle de la Vega

Two years ago I moved to a 5-acre farmstead in rural southeastern Minnesota with my partner Jeff after living in Seattle for 26 years. The year before I had met a woman from Minnesota who was visiting Seattle named Mandi. Mandi True actually is her full name. We spent an evening together watching the 4th of July fireworks from a boat on Lake Union. 

Two things happened in the first two months of life in Minnesota: I got married, and a good friend died suddenly. These two events intertwined themselves at the time in some monumental ways. One of the results was the complex and radical loss of part of the community we thought we were moving into. Joy and heartbreak all at once. Confusion. Isolation. Loss. Commitment. Shock. Hope. Swirling. Fallout. Fire.

The second time I saw Mandi True was at our wedding, a small affair among a grove of maple trees out in the meadow on our new place. 

The third time I saw her was at our friend’s funeral. 

About a week after the funeral, I got a letter in the mail. A plain letter sized envelope with my name and address on the front and hers in the return spot. I had no idea what to expect from such a gesture. Did I do or say something wrong? Did it contain good will, or perhaps disapproval of some kind? I set it on the table for a few days. When I did open it, I found inside a handwritten letter on classic college rule three hole punch blue lined paper with the red margin line on the left. Handwritten in pencil. 

Mandi wrote that she sensed I seemed lonely at the funeral. Even though I thought I had hefted on my suit of confidence armor in order to get up to speak in front of hundreds of people and field hours of social interaction with old friends of my new husband. Mandi wrote on that she had gown up in rural Minnesota, “a child of the country”, and that whenever a letter would come for her in the mail from her best cousin who had moved away to Alaska it made her feel less alone. So she said, she was going to send me her stories to give me something to look forward to. I’ve since learned that she has that certain ability to quietly observe what is going on with people. She saw me, and put simply, Mandi chose me. It is quite a thing to be so deliberately and bravely chosen, seemingly out of nowhere. And true to her word and her name, for the next 6 months or so Mandi sent me her stories. I loved them immediately. I loved her voice, the artful flow, unapologetic and stripped down truth of the way she expressed her thoughts and experiences. As she predicted, every time a letter sized envelope came in the mail with her writing on it a light turned on. An island. Anticipation. Delight. Respect. Gratitude. 

Since that first 6 months of hand written stories on blue lined college rule paper, Mandi and I have become close. Last night in one of our many long talks I asked if I could read one of her stories aloud for this project. She chuckled and said “sure”.