I opened the mailbox after giving it a few days of rest and found a handful of letters and cards inside. All held offers and grand promises, but nary one held real value.

Yes, all my financial problems are now solved since I received that magnetic AmEx credit card. Well, I might need to change my name to "Your Name Here" in order to cash in. I may not need the card at all, though, since I may have won $10 million from a magazine company. All I need to do is subscribe to three or four magazines that I won't read for three or four years. Even if I don't use them, there are several local offices and businesses that could use an infusion of reading material.

As wonderful as all this sounds, it only gets better. My property in Virginia has be revalued at a much higher rate, but I can appeal if I want to drive over there and waste a day listening to folks tell me, nicely, to "stop talking and start paying (or else)."

Did I mention that my auto insurance is due and I owe my dentist $5 more that the health insurance policy didn't pay? Maybe I can handle that since I also am pre-approved for another unsolicited $10,000 credit limit Visa card from the Bank of Poughkeepsie at a low introductory rate. If I had my glasses back, I'd read the fine print and find out what the real rate would be in six months. So lacking, I figured I better just toss the whole mess. On another bright note, if I die without paying my bills, it's comforting to know that I can get life insurance for incredible rates if I sign up now by sending in the little card in my mailbox. It is a special offer just for me; I'm sure the other 2,000 people in Sparta need not apply.

These days, very little of the mail I receive is desirable. The government has that do-not-call list, maybe someone will realize that my mailbox is filled with worthless junk and will make a do-not-mail list. But since the traditional hand-written and hand-mailed, envelope-stuffed and stamped letter is no more, I suppose the junk mail (and newspapers) are about all that keeps the postal service afloat.

Even bills are being handled on the Internet more and more. The other day I sat down at my computer and renewed my car's registration, paid my cell phone bill and my credit card balance and reconciled my checking account. I still mail a few of my bills every month, but at 41 cents each, I try to do whatever business I can via computer. It's hard to believe that most of the bills I pay now couldn't have even been imagined 30 years ago. Cell phone, Internet, cable television, and computers all seemed like science fiction. Dick Tracy's watch communicator wouldn't even draw a glance today.

I can still remember when I was a boy, I would write letters back and forth to my great grandmother and others in the family. Early on, most of the 'letters' were little more than alphabet soup and pictures. When people went on vacation, they sent others postcards to show off the beauty of the place they were visiting. It was a way of sharing the experience in a real and tangible way. These days it's usually digital pictures that are soon deleted and e-mails soon forgotten. I still have most of the letters I received as a young man and I still save them. I especially like to save those written with a real pen or pencil, maybe a museum somewhere would like to see them one day.

As a boy, I can remember that just the possibility of receiving a letter was enough to make me walk the half-mile or so to the mailbox. Being able to read it and imagine the pictures in my mind that the words created days earlier was nearly amazing.

These days I can count the number of letters I receive in a year on one hand. I do still get greeting cards with little messages inside, but the true art of the letter has nearly died entirely.

It has been replaced by the e-mail, a form of communication so often abused that it oft seems little more than a nuisance. People who never would have bothered sending a real letter will fire off an e- mail, usually in all lowercase or all uppercase letters with much of it in that Internet code talk. What would grandma have thought had I ended a letter with, "C U soon. LOL?"

Pen pals have gone the way of 'instant message pals', who are able to communicate in real time, thus dumbing down the conversation to near pointlessness. Is it any wonder that in this age of boundless communication, more people are more lonely and depressed? Trivial sentence-long communiques have replaced such deep thoughts as conversation, shared feelings and quiet muse. Letters were almost always respectful, even when they weren't positive. I guess it's harder to be nasty when you start your message with "dear" and end with "sincerely" or "yours truly."

There also is something beneficial to the author of a hand-written letter. Taking the time to put the pen to the paper gives the mind time to come to terms with things and conveys a message that is more well-thought-out and closer to the heart. I've seen letters where the actual writing style reflected the person's feelings. A particularly passionate plea is often quickly scrawled across the paper and difficult to read; a well-thought out letter is written more deliberately.

That's the other part about real letters that's hard to replicate. Each word is a signature. Anyone can look official with little more than a computer and a really big signature. I can't proclaim innocence; I spend more time writing checks than letters.

To invest lavish amounts of effort in a simple communication today conveys an innate sense of caring, of knowing that greater purposes than ourselves exist.

It's a sign of the times. We have too much to do. We don't even have time to talk to one another, let alone spend an entire evening on the porch. Instead we 'pop up' meaningless notes and have cell phone conversations with others when we should be paying attention to the people around us.

There is plenty of time to watch the latest made-for-TV scandal, to live vicariously through our 'idols', or even to search for news, gossip (or worse) on the Internet.

Kids are dragged about like rag dolls, only to be dropped here and there, without taking time to realize that what they really need is a real family (regardless of the makeup) that takes time to talk with them, listen and eat meals together.

Folks can't go out and visit the sick or elderly, but they can drive to another county to walk around the really big store, even if they don't need anything.

Maybe the stuff that comes in our mailbox reflects the shallow, uncaring people that we've become. We've replaced letters with offers for credit and other things we don't need, seasoned with bills we can't afford. What does that say about us—that our lives have turned to junk mail? I say it's a trend that grows daily, just like the American waistline.