Do people have time for "pen pals" anymore?

I don’t have pen pals. But sometimes I make great friends online from overseas; and they email me regularly. Not sure if that is regarded as the same thing.

I don’t have pen pals as such but Fluther and other social media have proviced me with long distance friends that I keep up with regularly. One of my good friends lives in Australia, another in Hawaii and another sometimes on a sailboat and sometimes on a farm in Bonaire.

And there’s a large cookie in Boston that I sometimes take an internet bite off of.

Not old fashioned pen pals but email friends. I have a couple members here that I exchange emails with now and then. Just last night a fellow jelly and I babbled on and shared some photos.

Pen pal? Pah!
Crayons are your best friend.

Edit: “provided”

Like @NerdyKeith I do have penpals all over the place, but it is via email. Envelopes, stamps, etc., are a bit of a pain. I commmunicate with old friends, friends of friends, net acquaintences, and fellow sailors presently sailing almost every one of the seven seas. I get their take on what is happening where they are and what they think of what’s happening in the States.

The most interesting stuff is coming out of Greece right now. The people are really unhappy with the present government, with extremist groups, both leftist and rightist, are popping up all over the place. They are on the edge of widespread civil unrest with skirmishes everywhere and the middle class family with kids is stuck right in the middle. At the same time, they are on the front line of the Syrian refugee invasion, hundreds of thousands of refugees coming in, many of them sick, into a country that has imploded economically where government corruption has become endemic. It’s a tragic mess.

@janbb: I like “provice”. Sounds just a bit naughty. ;-)

The subject of pen pals is always dear to me.

I have a few pen pals that I physically mail postcards, cards, and letters to in random places around the world that I’ve had for years now. I love the dying art of actually writing on stationary and sending it out to someone.

It’s actually how I met my boyfriend. We became penpals after meeting over Instagram, sending post cards and whatnot to each other until communication became more and more frequent over a year and a half (over Instagram, text, and email along side the physical cards and letters we’d send to each other) before leading to visits and then a relationship bloomed after that.

Bottom line? You make time for what you care about. People have time for pen pals if they choose to!

@janbb: Thanks for the nibble.

I have 6 or 7 pen pals that I write actual letters to, I used to have over 15 but many stopped writing. I also have 2 pen pals that I email. I have penpals from Canada, USA, New Zealand, Italy, etc. It’s really awesome.

I should. I have two friends, kids, who are in prison and need letters….

I had a early teenage romantic penpal when I was like 14. Met her in person briefly one weekend and we wrote letters to each other for a couple of years. For all of you millenials this was before the internet and when long distance calls cost $$$ a 14 year old did not have. Have not thought about that in years, wonder how she turned out.

I have a cousin who just landed in prison that I need to write. That’ll be the first “letter” I have written in a decade or longer.

My kid is pen-pals with another jelly’s kid.

(Which reminds me, it’s our turn.)

To me “pen pal” has been defined as “internet pal”. I have a handful of internet pals, most of which are here on Fluther. I try to make more friends but not every attempt succeeds.

Let me get back to you later. ~

www.penpal.com
Is worldwide and still has followers.
I write to a Pen pal in Brazil,but because of the time that mail reaches us from Brazil to Canada ( 90 days) as she sends by REGULAR mail??? we now email.

I would love to have a true pen pal and I love to send cards and postcards etc.
I went to penpal.com and that site seemed like more of a site where you are
looking for a mate. That is NOT what I am looking for. Maybe the penpal I
am looking for is really obsolete. I could write someone in the military that
needs a letter. Any ideas friends?

Time? Look how much time people spend on sites like this. Of course we have time. I do have pen pals through both written letters and emails.

@MooCows
I haven’t checked any of these out. Some may be crypto-dating sites, some not. The military one explicitly states it is not a dating site. They are mostly email. Only one of them listed below stated that they handled both email and snail mail.

Military Pen Pal (MPP) exchange, just read down the topics column.

Interpals purports to be an international pen pal site.

PenPalWorld

Global PenFriends

Email Penpals

15 Best Sites to Find a Pen Pal

If you Google Pen Pals around the World you get a half million hits.

@Espiritus_Corvus Thanks but I’m not looking for a pen pal.

Oh, sorry. I meant @MooCows. Damn. I’ve done this about five times now. Sorry.

^^Edited. Thanks, Molly.

I love pen pals. I was pen pals with @Bookish1 before he moved to France.

@MooCows
It is definately NOT a dating site!
It is spelled out clearly on their website.
It is screened very well by the administrators .