A simple ‘thank you’ note is a fresh and forever reminder of something good

I have a few old cards and notes pinned to the bulletin board on my office wall above my desk.

A few more cards hang by magnet on my refrigerator door at home.

A stack of old ones are tucked inside a desk drawer in my home office.

Thank you notes and cards.

Old-fashioned.

Hand-written.

Sent by traditional U.S. Post Service mail with an envelope and stamp.

Some Hallmark; some plain paper.

Some from many decades ago, and some new.

A “thank you” card or note arrives in the mailbox, along with bills and all the advertising supplements, like a glistening jewel in a pan of dull rocks.

I hang on to “thank you” notes.

Some are yellowish with age but the written message remains fresh, forever.

Thank-you notes serve as a reminder of something good. A person took time from their busy routines and wrote it down in ink, and bought a stamp, and went to a mailbox.

Sure, we can send a text, or email, or instant message. Point and click. That’s better than nothing. But it’s about as sincere as hugging your third cousin.

I like the old-fashioned, written, thank you card.

Something I can hold on to.

Read again.

I send “thank you” cards frequently but not as often as I should.

I’m going to do better.

Appreciation means a lot.

I have kept thank you cards from co-workers, peers and business associates. They could have sent me an email or text, or nothing at all. Notes of gratitude for help, advice, and friendships.

I have a note from a high school student from at least 10 years ago. She’s out of college. A young adult. Her note: “Thanks for speaking to my class and your encouragement to write. I love to write. What you said to my class yesterday is exactly the way I feel about writing – keep it simple, keep it clear, keep it fun …”

That same student sent me a note four years later when she graduated from college and was teaching in the Chicago area.

From a former employee: “… Thank you for admitting when you are wrong. That is so right …”

There are personal “thank you” cards from my Mom, aunts and friends.

For gifts.

For my help.

For my thoughts.

On my refrigerator, there is one from Bob Costas in gratitude for an old Cardinals photo I had sent him in the 1980s. He wrote a note on the back of a Mickey Mantle Hall of Fame plaque postcard.

One from my old neighbor, Norm, a veteran, to thank me for writing a column about the greatness of the Greatest Generation. “… that you remember and honor us,” Norm wrote. “We didn’t know we were so great at the time. We were doing what had to be done …”

Several notes from December 2016 after I had spent 18 days in the hospital after suffering a stroke. It was a weird time. The notes were comforting. I’m blessed and have experienced full recovery.

“Mack, thanks for being such a good friend. You’re the best ….”

“Terry – thanks for all the times you have dropped everything to listen to my problems and challenges. You have always been there for me. I’m here for you now ….”

“Thanks for everything. Get well. We’re not done with you yet ….”

Over the years, notes from readers of this column have arrived. A reader sends a note to the newspaper office and it gets forwarded to me. Something I wrote made them think, laugh, maybe even cry. I keep them all.

“Thanks for writing about the old days in East St. Louis. They were special times …”

“Thanks for keeping things so simple. I love your simple perspectives on life ….”

“We could be brothers, Mack. We think so much alike …”

November is the thankful month. We count our blessings. We pause and thank others. If not, we should.

Put down your phone.

Return to Old School.

Consider sending someone an old-fashioned thank you card or note.

Handwritten, in ink, with a stamp and tucked inside an envelope.

No emojis.

It says a little more than “Thank you.”