The Last School Bell

To you, who heard the last bell ring,

Welcome to the Storm Post Office. 1996, a northern mining town and its school. Faded olive utility paper; a blue hand-painted signboard title outlined in cream; in a fine engraving, a school bell and a winter window; a copper paper lunch token and a few gray-blue workshop diagrams. Everything is quiet, and everything feels faintly warm to the touch.

A poet, in exile, wrote to his old schoolmates years after they had left their school: “Wherever fate may fling us, and wherever fortune may lead, we are the same as ever: the whole world is a foreign land to us; our homeland is Tsarskoye Selo.” — Alexander Pushkin, October 19th (1825)

Tsarskoye Selo was the little town where they had studied, and the only home they would know all their lives. After the bell, some will go to the mine and some to far places, but the classroom will remember each of them. Write to your desk-mate; we will post it for you.

After the bell, take care

Storm Post Office

1996 · A northern mining town

P.S. A bell won't fit in the envelope, but it can be written in.