Your mailbox is a vessel for magic
“Your mailbox is a vessel for magic.” Stay with me.
Life is…often lacking in the magic department once you pass the age of twelve or so, and i think its a worthwhile pursuit to examine the ordinary aspects of our lives to see where we can get back a little of the ole’ razzle dazzle. Sometimes its relatively easy to do this. Dreams, gardening, walks in the woods, baths, food—all pretty easy to be spellbound by with just a bit of imagination. Mailboxes, perhaps less so. But just for giggles, let’s explore it for a second.
For a kid, sending and receiving mail is pretty miraculous. Speaking from experience here—both as a former child and as the parent of a 4-year-old that is currently entranced by the US Postal Service and all it’s wonders (we go through a lot of stamps in my house). Not only is your mailbox a way of receiving delights such as books, letters, toys your grandma sends you—it is also literally a direct line to the magical world. You can send a letter to Santa, for fuck’s sake.
Cut to: being a grown up. I don’t know, the delight of receiving mail has never been lost on me. Maybe its because I kinda sorta still believe in Santa Claus just a bit, but also mailboxes still feel like little portals—little vessels for time travel and teleportation. You can still have parcels of joy delivered to your front door. You can still ask them to bring bits of magic. I think it’s a poor use of their magic to only ever be sent utility bills and ads for lawn maintenance, and so have recently made a concerted effort to make it’s contents feel a lot more ✨enchanting.
All I’m suggesting here is that you allow yourself to see the everyday magic in what is seemingly mundane. Seek out folks who are also choosing to build a world of wonder, and use your mailbox as the thing that links you together. Move beyond Amazon, transcend your banking statements.
I’ve amassed a pretty fun collection of art mail in the last month or so, and thought I’d do a little round-up in case you too want to be re-delighted by your mailbox.
Recent art mail:
Mail blog
A project by artist Cortney Cassidy centered on redefining art, creating for creativity’s sake, and publishing the unpublish-able. Read more about it here.
I’ve been a subscriber of Katie’s for a while and was thrilled when she decided to branch out into irl letters. Muse club mailings feature creative prompts on one side and a little art print on the other. Satisfying in every way.
Kellyanne Makes Art
Kellyanne shared her haunted house drawing on my cross-section illustration post and its so good—had to get it.
Pen pals!
I recently acquired a pen pal and haven’t sent a letter out yet but am getting so much joy just thinking about the possibilties—Art trades! Stickers! Pressed plants!
(Wanna be pen pals??? DM me!)
Lava Lamp Lounge/ Art Pals:
Art Pals is nested within the Lava Lamp Lounge substack and is essentially a low-commitment pen pal circle. Add your info, send art mail to anyone else on the list, and receive surprise letters in return. Its low-key and fun.
Two I don’t subscribe to yet but am very interested in:
Catdrool Club
I love a good risograph flyer and Hannah’s work is *chef kiss*.
Addie Best's Patch Pals on Patreon
Addie’s work is so charming—I’ve purchased a few patches and buy her calendar each year, but haven’t done a Patreon yet.
Art mail I’ve subscribed to in the past:
(these were both delightful but I’m a woman with small art budget and infinite art interests)
Fiorenza Friends Club
Stickers, postcards, magnets and other goodies from Fiorenza Art/ Elena Fiorenza Gatti.
Sunroom
Monthly risograph flyer club!
More mail-centric delights:
Sandra Bullock and Keanu Reaves discover that the mailbox at the lake house they each live in is a time machine and spend almost the whole movie writing each other letters that do not respect the bounds of space and time. I watched this sometime over the winter— it’s actually pretty good.
Art on stamps!
There’s a whole world of stamp collectors giving me a resounding ‘duh’ on this one. I’m not a collector, but I AM about to go drop a bunch of cash on these Good Night Moon babies.
One more for the road:
ok bye! <3
Grateful to be a part of this! I love ART PALS 💌💕 Glad you're a part of it!
I sing the mail song daily