postcard

Strong Women on Postcards

February 26, 2022 Frank Incoming, Women 00:00:41 7 Comments

It’s always interesting to look at incoming postcards in the collective. To examine them from different levels of observation. (Reminds me a a bit like the Charles and Ray Eames film Powers of Ten.) When you stand back and look a while, and have the breathing space to do it without IG tugging at your shirtsleeve, patterns emerge.

Today’s pattern is Strong Women.

I recently wrote a piece called In Space, No One Can Hear You Scream. I featured a postcard of a Storm Trooper in a dirndl that was sent to me by JoAnn. Which led to JoAnn sharing the story with the designer — and to her sending me a gift of five terrific postcards from Allen’s Halsey’s Strong Women Series. You can find Allen on IG with the very clever handle Probably Not Emma Watson. And you can find his other work at InPrint. (I wasn’t able to find a direct link to his postcards, but I’ll keep looking and update this story when I find something. I will say the cards are printed very nicely — velvet touch matte coatings on the front give a really nice hand feel.)

In addition to the Strong Women Series, I also noted I have a few other terrifically strong women on postcards to add to this piece. The Mae Jemison card sent by Betsy is from a box set from Timbuktu Labs called Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls: 50 Postcards of Women Creators, Leaders, Pioneers, Champions, and Warriors. Plus, I added the Fannie Lou Hamer card from Lisa.

And Marilyn. Well, Marilyn. She needs only one name. And that quote I appended to the card with her on it. So was so good.

Here’s to the strong women out there. That’s you. Rock on.
Looking for a Friend
Irish
Stormy C
The Tie That Binds
Strong women don’t have attitudes, we have standards. — Marilyn Monroe (from Debbie)
Fannie Lou Hamer card (designed by Postcards by Lisa)
Mae Jemison, Astronaut & Doctor by Timbuktu Labs (from Betsy)

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A Handmade Tale

February 18, 2022 Frank Handmade, Incoming 0 Comments

If it’s a story I’m telling, then I have control over the ending…
But if it’s a story, even in my head, I must be telling it to someone.
You don’t tell a story only to yourself. There’s always someone else. Even when there is no one.

Margaret Atwood, A Handmaid’s Tale

I’ve mentioned many times how much I like handmade postcards. I’m actually really drawn to them. (Yeah, I didn’t mean to get that cute, but I think I’ll leave that in here.) They’re one-of-a-kind pieces of art. I always separate handmade cards from other cards when I get them. The trick is I’m still figuring out a way to display them. Right now I keep them in archival storage boxes. They vary so much in size I haven’t gotten an album approach yet, but I’m working on it. These wonderful handmade postcards will be in that mix.

Rachel laminated this original drawing of Biggie for a Valentine’s card
Betsy got enamel pins for the 50 states; then she made paintings. How cool is this one of the Nutmeg State?
Serece created this Sumingashi floating ink art card. I’m even Zen about the cancellation; it’s another art element.
Russ sent this beautiful card from NYC before Christmas. It took 7 weeks to come 90 miles north. Worth the wait.
Orla sent me a second Imbolc card! This one with a heart attached.
Tara was in a Magical Fairyland in November. This card arrived in February. I hope she’s still in Magical Fairyland. I’d stay.
Justin created this art card for InCoWriMo. Thanks a bunch, buddy!

My Punny Valentine

February 14, 2022 Frank Incoming, Romance 8 Comments

Since for me you were born too soon / And I for you was born too late / God forgives him who has estranged / Me from you for the whole year / I am already sick of love / My very gentle Valentine.

Written from prison in 1415 by Charles, the Duke of Orléans, to his wife
(and considered the very first written Valentine)

Nothing so dramatic is imbued in the modern Valentine’s Day cards below as compared to the Valentine’s poem Charles, the Duke of Oléans, wrote after he was imprisoned during the Battle of Agincourt. Sadly, Charles spent 25 years in prison and his wife died while he was in there. He wrote hundreds of poems and love letters while he spent those decades in prison; much of that writing was compiled into The Poems of Charles of Orléans.

About 550 years after that first Valentine was written, I was a kid, and I used to look forward to Valentine’s Day with great anticipation. I’d bring my bag of Valentines to school, with one signed for each kid in the class. And although the nuns would try to enforce the one-kid-one-card rule, they couldn’t enforce the quality of the cards. Back then, each pack of Valentines (I think there must have been 50 in a pack) had one larger Valentine. If you were sweet on someone, they’d get the bigger card. It was a big deal. Alas, I never got a big Valentine.

Those nostalgic days are gone. But happily, Valentine’s cards aren’t. Here’s a selection of Valentine’s cards from the here and now. And as far as I know, no one sent one from prison. (Although that would be kinda cool.)

By the way, as I was writing this I was thinking about Valentine’s songs. And you know what’s one of the worst songs ever written? It’s Frank Sinatra singing My Funny Valentine. Who in the effing hell thought that was a good song? Or that negging some nice person on Valentine’s Day would be charming? Not me.

A classic from Albert & Magda (I think Maggie wrote it)
Sheryl and I were a lot younger when we met
IndySuz made a very nice handmade Valentine with this Pantone postcard
A nice LouPaper card from Louise. Now I want some of those candy hearts.
Bean sent Bluebirds of Happiness. Did you know the origins of Valentine’s goes back to the observation this is breeding season for birds?
Kirsten & Lucy sent happy cats. Purr.
Nikita sent this a while ago about Rocky Horror Picture Show. But now I say, Happy VD.
When I got this sawtooth Rifle Paper postcard from Tracy in Michigan, I thought I hadn’t seen one like that.
But then, voila! This one came from Melissa in Italy. Double sawtooth Valentine’s Day.
Janet asks, “What is Cupid’s favorite band?” She answers, “KISS. Duh.” Haha.
Heres the spirit of the day from Katrinka at Sugar & Kiki. It’s about connections.
And this lagniappe from Sugar & Kiki is an extra postcard!
This is a special Matthew Kirscht (2022) limited edition of 36 that melds two holidays

Happy Valentine’s Day to you. I hope you find connections every day of the year.

Flaming Flowers that Brightly Blaze

February 2, 2022 Frank Art, Incoming 14 Comments

The artist Nikita Regina sent this Vase with Irises (1890) postcard that shows a Vincent van Gogh painting I was lucky enough to see in the Rijksmuseum once upon a starry, starry night. The magical quality of the card and Vincent’s work is beautiful, but Nikita’s needlepoint stamp outshines it all.

Flaming flowers that brightly blaze / Swirling clouds of violet haze / Reflect in Vincent’s eyes of China blue / Colors changing hue

Don McLean, Vincent (1972)
Vincent van Gogh features prominently in The Postcardist office

Besides having lots of Vincent paraphernalia in my office, I also could listen over and over to Don McLean’s song Vincent (which some call Starry, Starry Night). I had the original American Pie album, and that song concluded our 8th Grade dance. But it was Vincent that I listened to more often. That song sent me to the public library to learn as much as I could about the artist. What a bit of serendipity that I ended up living a 10-minute walk from the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam many years later. Or that last October, I sat on a cushion at the Immersive Van Gogh exhibit in Minneapolis and watched that experience play through three full times.

I never forgot how that fascination with Van Gogh all started. With a song. This song.

Just look at how special this is. Nikita used my magic number for the stamp value. Thank you.

Look at the magnificent detail on that needlepoint “stamp” Nikita created

E79: Amina McCain’s Pen Pal Club

July 19, 2020 Frank Podcast 00:44:12 4 Comments

These are trying times. And with the onset of Covid Summer, where we really can’t travel anywhere, my guest Amina McCain decided to do something about that. To create connections. And that’s where Amina’s Pen Pal Club originated.

In this show, I talk with Amina about creating her pen pal club, writing plays and monologues, acting in musicals, and drawing sketches for her original fashion designs. 

All this at age 13. Yes, Amina is a teenager. And an accomplished one. 

The essence of this show is that every creative endeavor starts with the word. And that is especially true with postcard and letter writing. So, tune in and be inspired.

E77: The Snail’s Mail — Postcards for People Who Love Postcards with Jess Davis and Charlie Davis

July 5, 2020 Frank Podcast 00:40:43 0 Comments

This week I’m joined by the talented mother-daughter team of Jess Davis and Charlie Davis. Jess is the proprietor of The Snail’s Mail, a New Zealand-based postcard shop. And Charlie is a postcard designer. Did I mention she’s 10 years old? 

In this show we talk about Charlie’s new postcard design that’s available on The Snail’s Mail store now. Jess talks about the new designs she has available, the challenges of postcarding in the Age of Covid, and lets us in on another creative project she has in development. 

Find The Snail’s Mail here

You can buy Charlie’s “adventure” postcard here

The Snail’s Mail on Instagram

Jess on Instagram

Charlie Davis — 10-year-old postcard designer
Jess Davis: Owner of The Snail’s Mail

Hawkeye the Postcard Pup

July 1, 2020 Frank Inside the Postcardist 0 Comments
Hawkeye licks his lips in anticipation of a treat

When I finish writing my postcards and other correspondence each morning, I take a photograph of what I’m sending. And when that camera clicks, that’s Hawkeye the Postcard Pup’s cue we’re going to walk to the mailbox. It’s a happy moment for him — he gets to sniff the post on the mailbox, chase a squirrel, and nibble a few acorns before he comes in the house for a treat. My treat comes a few hours later when the mail is delivered. Hawkeye and I both love postcards.

E27: Ziggy Stardust Sends Postcards from the Trans-Siberian Railway

July 30, 2018 Frank Podcast, Trains 00:26:10 0 Comments

Lillian (as Ziggy Stardust) at Podcast Movement

Ziggy Stardust and I are talking about postcards.

Okay, it’s not Ziggy, but it’s a striking likeness. I’m in Philadelphia with author, financial consultant and highly acclaimed podcaster, Lillian Carabaic. We’re talking about postcards; and she’s turning heads.

We’re sitting in the speaker’s lounge at Podcast Movement. Lillian just finished giving her talk — Breaking Through Creative Blocks Like Bowie — to 100+ podcasters in the most dynamic presentation of the four-day conference. She’s dressed in an asymmetrical blue spandex bodysuit festooned with lightning bolts. She’s sporting a magenta wig. Loads of blue eye shadow. And she’s perched atop iridescent six-inch platform boots. Perched might not be the right word — Lillian/Ziggy demonstrated an overhead kick while onstage in those tall boots. You see, she was once a competitive figure skater.

We met a couple days earlier in a keynote session. What were the odds that I got to sit near a storyteller who sent hundreds of geo-tagged postcards that she wrote on the Trans-Siberian Railway? And that we would start talking about postcards at all considering it’s a conference about podcasting? Oh, the odds. Must be like 2,500 to 1. (87.6% of statistics are made up on the spot.)

I wrote 273 postcards on the train as we crossed Siberia and Mongolia. And I geo-tagged them all.

Lillian and I talk about her travel from Dublin, Ireland to Holyhead, Wales on the ferry. Then on a train to Berlin. And Moscow. And on the Trans-Siberian Railway and Trans-Mongolian Railway to Beijing. And then one more train to Shanghai. (I wonder if she was listening to China Girl when her train rattled into The Land of the Red Dragon.) All the while writing postcards and geo-tagging every one of her postcards that she sent to fans who were following her journey.

This is Part 1 of what could be a multi-part interview series. Lillian is super high energy and so much fun. She’s interesting. And she writes postcards. With glitter.

Postcards written on the Trans-Siberian Railway

You can order Lillian’s book, Get Your Money Together: Your Purr-fect Finance Book, here.

Her radio show and podcast, Oh My Dollar!, can be found here.

And you can hire her to give talks and courses about financial planning by clicking here.

Music in the episode is Japanese Prog by Rushus and is licensed under a Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives (aka Music Sharing) 3.0 International License.

Get The Postcardist Podcast for free: Apple Podcasts | Android | Stitcher | TuneIn

E23: The Postcardist’s Wife

June 29, 2018 Frank Podcast 00:38:58 0 Comments

Image: The working desk at Postcardist studios.

A pile of postcards here. A stack of postcards there. A wax seal. A rubber stamp. Postage stamps. And boxes upon boxes upon boxes of postcards.

Ever wonder what it’s like to live in a house with a postcard guy? Namely…me? I this episode, you find out. My wife, Sheryl, joins me to about how a Christmas gift turned into a podcast; about putting a postcard writing station in our formal living room; and about how postcards are a part of daily life Chez Postcardist. Plus, we talk about the magic of Episode 23.

I hope you enjoy it as much as I did making it. And if you listen to the show long enough you’ll hear why I titled this show like I did.

E18: Master Class 2 with Mark Routh

May 24, 2018 Frank Podcast 0 Comments

Mark Routh joins me once again to conduct another postcard collecting master class where we cover the spectrum from the recent royal wedding to postcard design to QSL cards used in ham radio operations to the Titanic to postcard design to Doctor Who to postcards made by terrorist organizations. Yes, you heard me right…Mark gives us a lesson in the history of those cards and a perspective on collecting them.

You can find Mark’s work at Mark’s Postcard Chat and his monthly column is in Picture Postcard Monthly.

Also, I mention Chloe McHenry’s Etsy work. You remember Chloe from Episode 11. You can find her Etsy page at ParcelTonguePaperCo. Please go have a look. And if you’re inspired, buy one of her cool collages. Here’s an example:

Music transitions for this show are Japanese Prog by Rushus, from the album Stories. Stories by Rushus is licensed under a Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives (aka Music Sharing) 3.0 International License.

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