There is a week every year when nobody knows what day it is. The presents are opened, the calendar is blank, the leftovers have taken over the fridge, and you’re wearing the same sweatpants for the third day running. It feels like wasted time. It’s actually the best window you’ll get all year to write a letter to your future self.
Why the Week Between Christmas and New Year’s Is Made for This
The rest of the year, reflection has to compete with a schedule. In this one stretch, the schedule folds. Work is quiet or closed, and the people around you are as underscheduled as you are. You have the one thing a letter needs and almost never gets: an unhurried hour.
It’s also an honest week. The big performance of the holidays is over, and the New Year’s performance hasn’t started. You’re in the gap, where it’s easier to say how the year really went instead of how it looked in the group chat.
I should say how this differs from the other seasonal letters on this site. The New Year letter is about the person who has to keep your resolutions. The Christmas letter is about the holiday itself. This one is about the in-between: a look back and a look forward, written from the couch with a cold cup of coffee.
When to Write It
- The afternoon of the 27th or 28th. The relatives have mostly gone home and the quiet has settled in.
- Whenever you catch yourself scrolling. If you’ve been idly browsing for an hour, you have an hour to write.
- Ahead of time, if you’re the planning type. Write it in November, schedule it for next year’s quiet week, and the week itself stays yours.
For the delivery date, the simplest move is this same week, one year on. You’ll open it in the same kind of stretch you wrote it in, which makes the comparison easy. Hold My Letter delivers anywhere from one month to two years out.
What to Include
- What this year actually was. Three sentences, no spin. If you had to title it, what would you call it?
- The moments you want to remember. Small and specific beats big and generic. The dinner that ran four hours, not “family time.”
- What you’re leaving behind. A habit, a worry, a grudge, a job. Naming it makes it easier to put down.
- What you’re carrying forward. People, routines, and projects worth the effort.
- Where things stand today. Your work, your home, your relationships, your mood. Future you will not remember the details, and will want them.
- A small prediction. “By next December, I think I’ll have finally…” It’s fun to check, and it’s kinder than a resolution.
- A question for next year’s you. Ask what you genuinely want to know.
Prompts to Get You Started
- If this year were a chapter, its title would be…
- The best ordinary day I had this year was…
- The thing that surprised me most was…
- I’m proud of myself for…
- I’m still working through…
- The person who showed up for me this year was…
- What I’d like less of next year is…
- What I’d like more of is…
- A year from now, I hope you’re no longer worried about…
- Right now, at this exact moment, I’m sitting… wearing… eating…
That last one sounds silly, and it’s the line people tend to love most when the letter arrives. The mundane details are the first thing to fade.
How Hold My Letter Makes This Easy
If you have the quiet week and a decent pen, the Handwritten Future Letter ($19) is the one I’d choose. You write on paper, mail it in with your verification code, and we store it sealed and mail it back, unopened, on the date you pick. I have a small collection of fountain pens, and this is the week they earn their keep. The mail-in checklist covers what to send.
If your handwriting is a hazard or the week is busier than advertised, the Digital Future Letter is $9. Type it at /write and it arrives printed, sealed, and mailed to a US address on your chosen day.
FAQ
Is this the same as a New Year’s resolution letter?
Not quite. A resolution letter is about what you’ll do. A between-the-holidays letter is mostly about where you are right now: how the year actually went, what you’re carrying into the next one, and what you’d like to be able to say a year from now.
When should I have it delivered?
Most people pick the same week next year, so the letter lands in the same slow stretch it was written in. Hold My Letter delivers between one month and two years out, so a date in late December 2027 works if you write this December.
What if I’m writing this before Christmas?
That’s fine. If you’d rather not wait for the quiet week, write it now and set the delivery for next year’s. Having it ready also means you can enjoy the week instead of racing to start.
Handwritten or digital?
The Handwritten Future Letter ($19) is the keepsake version: you write on paper, mail it in, and we store it and mail it back on your chosen date. The Digital Future Letter ($9) is typed online and arrives printed, sealed, and mailed to a US address.
What if the year was a hard one?
Write it anyway, and keep it plain. You don’t have to find a silver lining. A letter that says “this year was rough, and here’s how I got through it” is exactly what you’ll want to read when the next hard stretch shows up.
Take the quiet week and spend one hour of it on a letter. Future you will be glad you did.