Life Sketches

Pen pal letters brought good news from France

For several years my friend Charlie ran an international pen pal business that he had inherited from his father. When I expressed some interest in the many countries people were writing from Charlie asked if I’d like a free subscription for my daughter and I accepted.

“You pick out the country and the pen pal,” Charlie said.

I’ve always been a Francophile so I chose France and a girl named Alessi Geoffrey. To my surprise my normally contrary teen-aged daughter, Elizabeth, went for the idea and almost immediately drafted a letter and even took it to the post office so that it would be sent out ASAP. In less than ten days a letter from Alessi arrived. To my worried surprise Alessi turned out to be a boy whose name if Americanized would be something like Jeff Alessi. I told my friend Charlie about the mix up and he responded with, “Don’t look at me. You’re the one who picked out the name.”