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  Close your eyes and think back to the time when you got your first computer. You were excited to explore all the ins and outs of this new contraption. You got set up with an internet provider and discovered the whole wide world at your fingertips. It was an exciting time. Did you feel like a kid at Christmas? Did you sit wide eyed in wonder? Do you remember what you explored first?

  It was a time when everything seemed so new. With that newness came a faster way to communicate with each other, a faster way to send and receive mail. The wonderful world of email opened up a whole new way to send letters, or inquiries. Were you excited to exchange email addresses with your friends and family? I was. I loved this new fast form of communication.

  I keep thinking about that movie with Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan. No, not that one, the other one, You’ve Got Mail. Right now all I can hear is that little voice saying those words. I remember coming home from work and turning on the computer to see if I had any emails. I felt like a kid in a candy store. The anticipation that I may have a letter from someone had me feeling giddy. Did you feel the same?

  Here’s my question… Where did those emails go? When did emails go from something personal to something soliciting? My emails have gone to pot. My eyeballs actually almost fall out of my head if I open my email to find something personal from a friend. Sending a letter has become a lost art. Worse, some emails I do want end up in my spam. Ugh.

  I know part of this is my fault. I do give certain stores my email address. I don’t mind getting an email advertising sales or whatever once a week. When that becomes more than once a day I unsubscribe. I’m part of LinkedIn. Recently they felt the need to start sending emails on a daily basis that I had no interest in. Unsubscribe. Bath and Body went from one or two a week to one or two a day. Unsubscribe. Writer’s Digest sends out stuff a couple times a week. When WD Partners send me solicitations daily I went in and Unsubscribed from WD Partners. Barnes and Noble, I’ve had enough with you. Unsubscribe. I’m part of a group on Goodreads. They send emails daily. Unsubscribe. As a matter of fact let me get out of the whole group. Writers that I signed up for a contest a year ago and never again, unsubscribe. Writers that I’ve never heard of that I get emails from… Unsubscribe. The people that are giving my email address away, unsubscribe.

  I think you see where I am going with this. I miss the good ole days where I got an actual letter in my email. I may not get phone calls from solicitors anymore. I believe they have all moved on to nagging people through email. I give certain people/businesses my money. Even though I do that it doesn’t mean I’m inviting you to my personal computer.

  Do you receive real letters via email? Has your inbox turned into a junk box? Have you stopped doing business with a certain company because of their obnoxious emails? Do you unsubscribe only to find yourself continuing to get more emails from said company? Am I over reacting?

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