For six years, classical singer Patricia Hammond was unwittingly sending handwritten cards to a total stranger. What happened next transformed both their lives…. Postcards are magical. No number of digitally shared images can replace the physical fact of a friend thinking of you: these tiny cards are worth so much more than the stamp and the picture.
Yet a survey of holidaymakers conducted by Gatwick Airport in showed that only 28 per cent said they sent postcards while on holiday, compared with 70 per cent in I even send them from the eastbound platform at Bath Spa station, where the obliging Victorians embedded a postbox in the wall. I can be scribbling out the address as the London train pulls in — sometimes addressing it to London. It started when I moved to Europe from Canada 17 years ago.
So I sent postcards. To my parents, my brother, my friends, my exes, and even the parents of exes. Jim, a jazz pianist, and I had split amicably and his mum and I had interests in common. I often saw postcards I thought would appeal to her old-fashioned aesthetic. I was in the depths of rehearsals at Wexford Opera in Ireland when my mobile rang.
It was early evening and I was just about to go and find a hot whiskey. I loved the card from Switzerland with the bell-ringers. Every time a singer on the radio had a first name starting with P I wondered if it was you! And when you asked if Jim was still composing, I phoned the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra and asked if they ever played any compositions by a James. She went on to explain her thrill when, on a postcard from Berlin, I did sign with my first name.
Another piece in her six-year puzzle. And then it was the card from Wexford that did it. She made enquiries about opera in Wexford and learned that of all the casts from the three operas that year, there was only one singer called Patricia. Her hairdresser found my number on the internet. I phoned May today and was so pleased to tell her that you have been thinking of her all these years. But she very kindly allowed me to keep the cards. They are precious to me.
