Letters to Strangers
By Caroline Roy, Co Editor-in-Chief, The Hoofbeat
In a 2012 TED Talk, Hannah Brencher told the story of her
relationship with letter writing. Burdened by depression
in her twenties, she began writing anonymous letters and
leaving them in the public spaces of New York City.
What started as a coping mechanism turned into a full
time occupation. As Hannah blogged about her letters, she
gained a large online following and ended up creating a
movement of positive, anonymous letter writers.
English teacher Adrienne Hollifield decided to make “Love
Letters to Strangers” a reality in her own classroom. She
had her senior students come up with letters to place
around the school. Some contained pick-me-ups, while
others offered wisdom, introspection, or an account of
the day.
“The project struck me as poignant for graduating
seniors who are going off alone into unknown places. It’s a way
to deal with the loneliness of being human,” Hollifield said.
Hollifield used Brencher’s TED Talk to revive the art of letter
writing in a way that was easy and tangible.
“I was surprised at how lovely these turned out. I wish that
we could have seen people picking them up and taking them,”
Hollifield said.
Before the bell rang one Friday afternoon, the AP English class
slipped letters into lockers, bathroom stalls, and library shelves
for others to find.
Hollifield said, “It’s
just a random act of kindness. You have to have faith that
you can affect someone in some way. They are a bit of
kindness in a somewhat indifferent world.”
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