Penpals - made to feel stupid.

I got a penpal when I was nine years old and now that I'm 18, I still write to her. I never thought it was a problem, but last week my friends were asking me about it and they all seemed to think it was really weird. One in particular made me feel really small and was like, "Yeah, I had a penpal when I was like twelve.....not anymore though...." I felt really immature and stupid. Is it weird to have a penpal at this age?

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Reply 1

black_mamba

No its not weird, your friends are just not very open minded people.

Reply 2

aleathiel

no there's nothing wrong with it, its nice actually that you've been writing for so long :smile:

Reply 3

pink_lucie

who cares what other people think, its your life not theirs.

Reply 4

Tw!stEd

I talk to a load of people on the internet....
No real dif in my opinion..

Reply 5

linksys

having a penpal for 9 years is really cool. wish i had one like that....oh yeh and it's not weird

Reply 6

Segat1

I still talk to my penpal from Florida. He's cool, we've been writing/emailing etc for about 12 yrs now. No biggie your mates sound like tools.

Reply 7

ChemistBoy

Good for you that you've managed to stay in touch with someone for so long, especially through a period of you life where things change so much. Most people lose touch with their penpals because they simply lose interest, not because they have grown up.

Reply 8

silverbolt

i think we all had a penpal at some point or another and the vast majority of us stop writing to them i know i did

well done on keeping it going and no your not wierd

Reply 9

sparkle86

yea i used to have a penpal but we sorta lost touch/interest i guess.

id love to get another penpal though. its not weird at all. :smile:

you're friends definitely dont seem open minded at all.

karen x

Reply 10

_Jax_

That's kind of cute you did it all that time, if they are the opposite sex you should meet and start dating and then make some sort of british rom com about it.

I don't know how anyone had the patience as a kid to have a pen pal, you must have all stayed indoors and played with your abacuses while the cool cats were out falling out of trees. Also now we have the internets so penpals are obsolete.

i think its cool

I've had the same penpal for about 13 years (cringe, I'm old) and no-one has ever been weird about it. It's no worse than writing a cousin or a friend that's moved away. Your mates are just being stupid.

Reply 13

Theresa Smells

My Gran is over 80 and has had her pen pal since she was 10 years old!

Reply 14

Shreerac1

Maybe its time to write it off :wink:

Reply 15

Angelharpist

They're possibly just jealous that you've got friends other than them, and that you've known the penpal for maybe longer!

I'm still very good friends with a lot of my french penpals, and we get practically free holidays by visiting each other. Plus, there'll be someone to help me with my French degree when I begin in October :smile:

They're just threatened by the fact that there's someone else that's on their 'friend' territory. I'll bet they've got 'friends' who they met on the net - it's exactly the same thing...

Ignore them, and enjoy your friendships :smile:

Reply 16

tocktick

it's uncommon but it's not weird. i dont really see why your friends would make a big deal of it. if one of my friends still communicated with a friend by post, i'd be curious and surprised you'd been writing to someone for so long but i'd also think that it was pretty cool.

Reply 17

loopymeg

What's weird about that? My friend still writes to her German penpal, and occasionally she asks us to check the letters for her for accuracy, or ask for ideas about what to write about.
I used to have a French penpal, but we didn't have anything in common so we don't write to each other anymore.

Reply 18

FeedTheGoat

It is slightly odd. I can imagine the type of person you are with the rep you've got and this just confirms peoples' suspicions.

Of course it is odd. She had one when she was 12 how old are you like 13?