All my life I’ve only ever been moved to write poems but never letters, let alone love letters.

I’ve never seen myself as a romantic person, nor one to put my feelings in unpoetic form onto a page for another person to read.

I also have the worst handwriting. The kind that starts off slightly nice and neat, but towards the end of the letter turns to chicken scratch and becomes messy and jumbled together.

But I got into a relationship last summer, and unfortunately, my boyfriend lives back in my home state, in Raleigh, North Carolina. Before I came back to start my senior year here at UK, he suggested we send letters to each other.

I was unsure about it at first, but I found the suggestion endearing and worthy of trying to keep our relationship strong. I’d never sent letters to anyone before and knew little about the postal and mail-shipping world.

When I first started, I had numerous letters returned to my mailbox because I forgot to add a stamp onto them. Always add the stamp. The first time I learned how to write and send a letter was in elementary school, and I pretty much forgot everything I learned since then.

But thankfully, writing and sending letters is easy, especially if you stock up on envelopes, paper and stamps. Sending love letters can be a great second form of communication for couples in long distance relationships.

Not to mention, you can keep all the letters and reread them if you are ever sad or deeply missing your significant other.

They are also a great way to get all your feelings out on a page and can be cathartic, especially since they are going to someone you trust with your emotions and feelings.

I also think committing to stay in letter correspondence with your significant other, whether far from one another or not, gives a lot of insight into your communication style and your partner’s style as well.

My boyfriend and I are passive communicators and try to steer away from confrontation, but by opening up to one another more through these letters this school year, we’ve grown a lot in how we effectively communicate when one of our feelings are hurt or if we are just feeling down with life in general.

I constantly reread the letters my boyfriend sends me and enjoy the time I get to spend crafting letters for him too. I always feel so much lighter afterwards, and receiving a letter from him in the mail never ceases to brighten my day.

If you are in a long-distance relationship, or even if you aren’t, letters are a simple and romantic way to communicate with your lover, and you get to hold onto them forever!

Sometimes, it might be hard to start a letter or figure out what to say, but I always start mine by talking about my day or how I am feeling.

It also helps get worries and anxieties out that you may not be ready to tell your partner in person quite yet, allowing you both the time to think on it and come together later to properly discuss whatever the worry may be.

Amid advancing technology and instant communication with social media and iMessage, I think it’s nice to take a step back and try an old school way of messaging your partner.

Sending and receiving letters has taught me patience — a virtue I’ve never been one to master. The wait is always worth it, though.