Thank you for the wonderful thank-you reminder
Dear Rich,
Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Forgive my use of this electronic medium to express my appreciation for your wonderful article on the written thank-you note.It will expedite receipt of my endorsement of your comments.
As parents, my wife and I took great effort to instill in our children the importance of a written thank-you note — whether it be for a gift (the most obvious of reasons), a favor given, or simply for one of those random acts of kindness that often come our way.
Our parents did the same for us — often standing at our shoulder as we wrote those precious notes. We like to believe that the lessons imparted at ages 6 through 12 were not forgotten.
I could fill pages with examples of the failure to express, in a timely manner, even a few words of thanks.
Most notorious on my list are the newlyweds whose preoccupation with other matters causes them to delay — or even entirely overlook — this common courtesy. On more than one occasion we have heard the excuse that “we wanted to wait for our wedding picture so it could accompany our thank-you note.”
Is a six-month detour through the photographic process for a wallet-sized image an appropriate excuse for failing to promptly acknowledge receipt of a gift?
O tempora! O mores!
Peter Kern
Brodheadsville
