But before we break into song, let me tell you why we're singing this particular song. 

At first it seemed that it wouldn't be too hard to find what I was looking for:  stationery to write a letter on.   Not stationery to write a tiny note on, not stationery that acted over-familiar with the recipient, seeking to share a sly wink  by having naughty little jokes on it, not stationery that was all design and no room to write on it.  Just writing paper that could carry a newsy letter to someone and wouldn't make too big a deal about it.

By the time I checked the stores in my town and found nothing I knew I'd have to pull out the big guns and go to the Impossibly Chic paper store in downtown Big City.  Though it meant leaving my visiting mother-in-law in the care of her son for a few hours, I did drive eastward on the freeway of neverending construction, missing only one vital, but ever-changing exit point.  Once I could get off the freeway there was festival traffic to crawl along with--this weekend is the big Irish Fest hoopla at the lakefront grounds.  Finally I unstuck my car from the hoopla-bound and went to the shop.  Now you may start warming up your voice, because the singing will commence soon.

The Impossibly Chic shop has all kinds of paper goods, nice paper, hard-to-find goods that are sold by a sales force proud to work at the place.  Besides the trendy salespeople, the place was crowded with brides-to-be and their long-suffering mothers, sisters, and best friends.  The long suffering were being dragged through a huge torturous stock of things that only brides-to-be are interested in.  If you're interested in the bride-to-be or feel that you at least have to act like you are, you lash yourself to her and get dragged along.  By the looks on the faces, some of the younger sisters and even some of the mothers were bored silly with the whole wedding planning project.  There were mutinies brewing in Bridal Land.  Luckily I could go to the stationery aisles, safe from impending cat fights.

But here's the thing I learned at the shop today.  Apparently people do not write to each other anymore.  They may sign their names on a card to put onto a present and they might write very brief thank-you notes, mostly it looks like they fill in blanks on invitations and announcements or have them printed,  but people definitely do not write letters. 

The only writing of any length that they do is only done in books called "Journal".  The store was stuffed to the doorways with these "Journal" books.  Apparently in this Journal thing the writer writes to herself or to himself and the writing is read only by himself or herself.  It's an interesting step in the progress of human communication;  Human beings now write only to themselves, thereby sparing other human beings the bother of wading through  misspellings, bad grammar, and ideas that may not be just like theirs.

After a long search I did  find nice big sheets of stationery on a low shelf stuck back in a dark corner and I'm looking forward to filling them with my misspellings, bad grammar, and odd and wispy thoughts.

That calls for a celebratory song and  I have the perfect song.  It was written back when people knew how to write letters, when missives flew back and forth between people the way emails do now.  It's been recorded by the biggies who do not need first names: Sinatra, Martin, Waller, Manilow, Haley (and the Comets, of course). 

Ready?  Let's do it!  Put some pep in it, people: