23. The Pigeonholes

There is a wooden shelving unit on the wall opposite Matron’s room with pigeonholes in alphabetical order. This is where our post is sorted and filed when it is delieverd.  I have butterflies in my stomach when there is post addressed to me in the pigeonhole labelled B.

I have told all my friends in Monticelli how much I love receiving their letters and postcards and they do their very best. Sandra, Aurora and Ale all write to me at least once or twice a term and I write back. Even just a few words is good enough. The very act of opening a letter feels special.

My father writes more often than my mother. Writes is probably the wrong word for it. He sends postcards, not letters. I love those postcards. I treasure them. They are almost always of modern art, from a gallery he has visited wherever he is travelling; New York, Copehagen, Amsterdam, Hong Kong... He doesn’t write much on the back, usually just a few words. But I love how he signs off ‘Love, Daddy’. I admire his neat, small, slanted handwriting. I feel warm and fuzzy knowing that he has thought of me. His postcards feel like the only tangible evidence I have of his love for me when he is so far away, a replacment for his steady, cashmere hugs.

Marraine, my mother’s godmother who is also my great aunt, writes to me from time to time. I recognise her letters immediately. Her large curly handwriting, penned with her Montblanc fountain pen is elegant and bold. I wish I could write like that. I like practising handwriting. I try different styles with different pens. I have quite a repertoire. Last term I was accused of cheating in my exams because halfway through the paper I swapped pens and my handwriting looked so different the teachers were convinced I’d passed my paper to another girl to write. They only believed me when I showed them my English exercise book where they found more than four completely different styles of handwriting.

The best letters are from my Italian boyfriends. On the days when a love letter arrives from Massimo, Checco, Davide or Fabrizio, all my friends gather around for the reading. Davide always uses the same fine, airmail paper and envelopes with the blue and red stripes around the edge so I always know when I have a letter from him as soon as I get to the pigeon holes. I have to translate as obviously the letters are in Italian. They are long and romantic and often contain little pictures or doodles. I feel so special and very grown up. No one else has a boyfriend, let alone a different once each year after the summer holidays! I read them over and over again.

I look forward to checking the post every weekday. Receiving a postcard or a letter feels like a lifeline. It reminds me that I am connected to the outside world and to the people who care about me.

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Those letters truly were a lifeline. They connected me to love and relationships, something that was sorely missing at school. It may sound dramatic to liken Oakdene to a prison but it many ways it was a little like one. There we were, day in day out, enclosed in one compound. We were not allowed out except for brief trips to the shops or to church on the weekends. We did not watch telly (except for Wimbledon and when we petitioned to be allowed to watch the 'Who killed JR’ episode of Dallas.) There were no newspapers that I remember and we were only allowed to listen to the radio on weekends, until we reached the sixth form. We were isolated from the world, from our families and communities. We had our own community but one where none of the adults had a personal or caring relationship with any of us. We woke up, ate, washed and went to bed to the sound of a fire bell. The food was grim, there were no toys or games, very little comfort of any kind in fact. Sound a bit like jail to you? So letters were like gold dust to me. And I have kept every single one, I still have them in a box on top of my wardrobe!

Go to the next story: 24. Gainsborough