General Chat

a long-standing acquaintance of mine is still alive. I met Dorothy many many years ago through our mutual interest in family history after we found we were loosely related. We have corresponded ever since firstly by letter and in later years by email. However I have not heard from her this year and did not receive a birthday card at the beginning of 2013. I tried email - nothing. As she is in her nineties now I began to fear the worst but have been unable to find any trace of an obituary. I sent her a Christmas card as usual this year but put 'sender: my name & address on the back in case she had moved, was in a home or whatever. This card has not been 'returned to sender' so I don't know what to think or what to do next to find out. Has anyone any other thoughts on how I can find out if my friend is still with us ? Thanks.

possibly write to a neighbouring address, explaining things......???

years ago, it might have been possible to look up a nearby address's phone number............a shop or something and ask there............but with todays mobiles...............not in a phone book methinks.....

Yes Bobtanian, that is a thought. Dorothy was on the phone years ago but I have not got her phone number and do not know if she reverted to a mobile. Thanks anyway.

Great I have just found a telephone number via BT free directory enquiries. I don't know how up to date it is, but am going to ring. Fingers crossed.

Brilliant - I've found her and spoken to her. She is now 96 and very frail but still with her old spirit. I am so pleased.

What a great story, Margaret. I so like a happy ending. :-D

That is wonderful Margaret good old BT great when it works :-D :-D

Excellent news.

I had a friend in Worthing. We were good friends but sometimes didn't see or communicate with each other for a year or more.

I left a couple of messages on her answer phone saying where are you and where were you last year too?

Eventually I started asking around the places she was involved with, the church, the Girls Brigade etc, and found that she had died last Christmas.

I was a distance away and not family so had not been informed.

Didn't see much of her but I still miss her.

Fait accompli!

well done glad to help!

Bob

I am pleased you managed to make contact with your friend, Margaret, I have had it happen to me and this year seem 'short' of several cards from longstanding friends of family and such. I am sure there will be late arrivals when I get to my address (o.h. using car for work in bad weather so I have been a bit housebound in that respect) but it does worry me. I hope most people's relatives would do as I did when my Mum died, I went through her address book and called all those I could, most of them I knew or knew of luckily.

I was pleased to get an email from an old friend/boss who I have kept in touch with since I retired 6 yrs ago. I knew she had been poorly and had hoped her family would have let me know if she had died, but they were a strange lot so wasn't sure. However, she wrote me a lovely email letting me know how she is (not in good health and in and out of hospital lately but fighting on.) She must be in her early 80s now. The thrill I got from hearing from her was wonderful, made my day.

It's sad when you have to turn sleuth to find out the fate of old friends and to know you have missed the chance to say your last goodbyes.


Lizx

Putting your address on the outside of the envelope doesn't always work, unfortunately.

Over here, it is standard to put name and address of sender in the top left corner on the front of the envelope .............. we all buy either stamp pads and stampers or sticky labels with our names etc on them, so we don't have to write it out every time.

Neither the US nor the Canadian Post Offices appreciate mail without return addresses on them. Not sure if it is an actual "law", but it is certainly expected.


However, we had a friend who was over 90, a childhood friend of OH's father!, and in care. We knew that she had gone past the stage of replying, unless a friend visited and did it for her.

We sent a Christmas card for 3 or 4 years after she reached this point, then I wondered if she was still alive.

I phoned the care place ......... got an absolute rocket from the woman who answered the phone as to why we had never visited (in a different town).

It turned out that Edith had died just before the previous Christmas.

The care place had NOT returned the card to us.

The woman who gave me the rocket actually told me that I was lucky that she had answered the phone! She had retired but had returned to help out that day ............. she said that no-one else would have recognised Edith's name.

That's a sad commentary in itself, isn't it?!

I sometimes put my return address on the back of things Sylvia, but it takes ages for stuff to be sent back, I had a card returned after 5 months, and I am sure half the time the post office don't even bother to do it.

I got the impression that it was expected that American correspondence had a return address sticker on the top left hand corner of mail from way back.

It's very sad that you hadn't heard about your friend Edith's death but lucky you picked the day the retired woman was helping out so she could tell you what had happened to the poor lady. As you say a sad commentary that no one else would have remembered her.

Lizx