In the quiet hinterland between Christmas and New Year, within the unrealistically long list of jobs I’ve earmarked for those days, one task is always uppermost in my mind: thank you notes. In modern times they’re more accurately described as “Lesser Spotted Thank You Notes” having become endangered recently. It might be unfashionable to say so, but surely if someone has bothered to source, wrap, and deliver a gift with your name on it, the least you can do is whip out a biro and send them a postcard? Does a WhatsApp message count? Can an emoji ever be heartfelt? Perhaps… but this is last resort territory, only one up from stone cold ungrateful silence.
For children, thank you letters are a painful chore. As the mother of a nearly 14-year-old, I’m a veteran jolly-alonger in this department. I used to believe that having really nice stationery would help, forgetting that you have to be pretty grown up to appreciate fonts and pantones. Nevertheless, my son Kit’s stationery has been through multiple iterations, maturing through themes from cowboys, planets and stars, a blue whippet (to match his puppy Dash) and these days his correspondence cards are so smart and soulless, they resemble a Government White Paper.
It’s true that lavish stationery can compensate for a too-pithy message. You can get away with a “Loved the merch – fanks!” if your envelopes are tissue-lined, your name is engraved and your paper stock so heavy it counts as a small parcel.
I love the team at Mount Street Printers who don’t mind if you stand there for hours deliberating between the mustard and claret colours (in the end I ordered both). For the children, I use Papier because their extensive range of designs and motifs can evolve to match any mood or occasion. For beautiful notelet and letter writing sets, Choosing Keeping have many options including a range inspired by 1970’s airline colours. And when the best bet is a perfectly chosen greetings card, Closet and Botts always have just the right thing.
Whatever the design, in our house, the process remains laborious. “Be funny! Be charming! Write with flair! And panache!” I shout, in my most grating, motivational voice, while brandishing a ball point and an intimidating list of presents + donors. But for kids, even getting the basics right is difficult. Spelling is problematic, although I personally love a letter with evidence of manic rubbing out and crossing through (it shows you’ve made an effort). When Kit was six, he wrote a holiday diary entry in which every single word was misspelled apart from (cringingly) “Campari” – creative spelling is charming if you get across the general gist.
Handwriting is also an issue. The childhood instinct to speed-write a pile of thank yous is pathological and in my experience, it doesn’t matter how many times you say, sanctimoniously, “your name is at the top of that paper, you should feel proud of the words underneath it” because that is a sentence entirely devoid of meaning for anyone under the age of 16. I’ve posted many of his illegible letters, knowing they will be received with utter bafflement before being binned. After much frustration, I enforced a brutal but effective policy – if I can’t read the letter, you have to start all over again. This, combined with a bowl of Smarties (one Smartie per letter, for sustenance and keeping spirits up) transformed his handwriting and whilst Kit will never manage a career scribing medieval illuminations, we no longer waste quite so many stamps.
The only time he positively rushed to get pen to paper was on the occasion his godmother Louise gave him a digital alarm clock with BATTERIES SELLOTAPED TO THE BACK. He declared this detail “heroic” and continued to wang on about it long into February. I suppose this proves that it’s much easier to thank someone for something you wholeheartedly adore.
Timing is important and this is the bit I am bad at. Good thank yous arrive promptly. And yet my daughter’s 3rd birthday notes went in with the Christmas cards (her birthday is in September and she eked out the opening of her presents well into November, creating a major clash in my correspondence schedule). The good news is, I’ve discovered the ultimate hack - I now pay Kit 20p a letter to ghost-write his sister’s. Naturally this is an exercise in farce but means I don't have to lift a finger. And as a ghost writer, he has an energy and enthusiasm entirely lacking in his own works. He wrote all her new-born letters, attributing her with a variety of wild personality traits I’m glad never materialised (and some that did). This new system works because he takes it more seriously when he’s writing on her behalf; it’s both official business and parlour game. He writes with a mischievous smirk and then reads them out loud for our entertainment. Suddenly this tedious job becomes a performance, honing both his literary and stand-up skills. And as far as she is concerned, it just confirms his status as a member of her substantial administrative staff.
The best thank yous I’ve ever received have either come attached to a whopping bouquet of flowers or have been so agonised and tormented that I have myself cried while reading them. For my 40th birthday party, I took a carriage on the Royal Scotsman and stuffed it full of my girlfriends for four days. The letters that followed were all along the lines of how much this trip had ruined the rest of their lives. This wasn’t my intention, but it turns out, once we’d been THAT spoiled, it was impossible to integrate back to normality.
When you’ve thrown a party and are in that post-euphoric and exhausted slump, there is nothing nicer than receiving a belting thank you card. The greats feature attention to detail, recollections of drunken hilarities you weren’t witness too, and tactful omissions of the ones you were. They notice the flowers and the menu and the sparky connections made amongst your guest list. They might be just a few sentences but they’re time machines, whisking you back into the moment. And they’re evidence that all the planning and the fuss was worthwhile. Those letters are the things that last, and best evoke memories (unless you are one of those extremely smug and well organised people who print their phone pictures in commemorative books. Incidentally my resolution for 2024 is to become one of those people).
And if you need real inspiration, stick a pin in any page of any of Shaun Usher’s epic Letters of Note collections, to be reminded of the art and elegance of a perfectly executed missive. My favourite is Roald Dahl’s 1989 letter to 7-year-old Amy, thanking her for her present: “Taking inspiration from her favourite book, The BFG and using a combination of oil, coloured water and glitter, Amy sent the author a very fitting and undeniably adorable gift: one of her dreams, contained in a bottle.” If you are an author of stories for children, this is surely the ultimate gift? The stuff that dreams are made of. I’m certain Dahl wrote back to her immediately, in his favourite pen, on his very best paper. And I’m certain Amy treasured that letter forever. A heart emoji wouldn’t have been enough.
