A Letter For Cathy by Kathryn Hitte is one of the most adorable books I have ever read. Truly.
Every day, Cathy watches the mailman deliver letters to her parents and to all of her neighbors, but there is never a letter for Cathy. So, one day, Cathy decides to speak to the mailman about it:
“You always have a lot of letters, “ she said. “Will you give me one? Will you please give me a letter?”
The mailman and Cathy were very good friends. He smiled at Cathy.
“These letters are not mine,” he said. “They belong to other people. I only take them to the people they belong to. I cannot give them away.”
Cathy was very sad.
Cathy wanted to know how she could get a letter. The mailman kindly told her, “You will write a letter. Send it to someone you like. Then I think that person will write you a letter. Then I think you will get a letter of your own.” And with that, Cathy knew exactly what to do. She knew where the pencil was. She knew how to put squiggles on the paper. She only needed a little help from her mother to write in shapes that Aunt Betty could read. But, she could sign her name and Aunt Betty would know that the letter was from her.
Sweet Cathy mailed her letter and then had to learn the lesson that it takes time for the letter to travel to Aunt Betty and for Aunt Betty’s letter to travel back to Cathy. After six days, the mailman came up to her house with just one letter. “It is not a letter for Mother. It is not a letter for Daddy… it is a letter for you!”
Cathy was so delighted to receive a letter that she had her mother read it to her again and again and again until “she knew every bit of it by heart.” And then, when Father came home, Cathy read the letter to him.
This charming story was published in 1953, and I wish that it would come back into print again for new generations to love. If you are treasure hunting, be on the look out for A Letter for Cathy by Kathyrn Hitte. As it is out of print, you can read it on Internet Archive, but at the time of writing this review, some of the pages are missing from that record.
