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Yesterday I was talking about a pitch and we were all enthusing about postcards and their role in engaging people. We’ve a nice old paper on that in the archive. I’ve always liked it’s name: ‘Slow Knowledge: uses of the postcard in re-forming organisational time, place & meaning’.
In the conversation I was reminded of something I meant to blog last week on the rise in sending postcards reported by the Royal Mail:
There are certain things about postcards that people like using. They are a physical connection with the recipient, unlike a text or e-mail.
I wonder how many secret trends of this kind there are. Postcards on the rise. Paperless office as much a myth as ever it was (especially mine). The headlines and assumptions at odds with what’s actually going on. It’s an interesting noticing gap.
Here are a couple of noticings from last week, poscards from London and Vienna if you like.
An allotment in St James Park. The Churchill Museum & Cabinet War Rooms are running a Dig for Victory education programme. I looked through the windows in the fence to see runner beans carefully staked to hazelwood twigs, and cabbages bursting frowsily into July glory. Instantly I was about 8, sitting under my grandad’s gooseberry bushes.
From there I wandered past Trafalgar Square where they were setting up for the open air beaming of the Marriage of Figaro from the Royal Opera House. People and pigeons, all settling down to an evening of opera? That wouldn’t have happened in my childhood. They showed a fantastic trailer, I think for La Boheme, although my opera knowledge is dodgy to say the least. Two girls sitting in a cafe, while one gossips, apparently about rape and murder and disguise going on in a friend’s life. The rest of the cafe is agog. The listening friend is gripped by delighted horror. In my storyish mood is reminded me of the huge difference simply having a listener makes to the teller, and how few listeners there are in organisations. It’s all about listening and we never allow the time and room for that. I remember a nice turn of phrase, ‘listening stories out of people’. Can’t remember who though.
I flew from London to Vienna for a few days to catch up with family. While I was there, we visited the Cemetery (so much nicer as Friedhof in German I always think). Set on the outskirts, in vineyards. Entrancing. What I most noticed was the tidy rack of watering cans. Not something you’d find in a London cemetery I suspect.
I think my next blog should be woodier. Roger Deakin.
