This past school year, my freshman year of college, has been the longest continuous time I’ve been away from my twin brother.

Before the longest we’ve ever been apart was during high school when he had a research opportunity and I had an internship in Taiwan, and even then, it was only for around 2 weeks that we were actually separated. As with such a bond, this long separation from attending two different schools has been strange and somewhat alienating. I was used to always having a partner in crime, an automatic study buddy, someone who’s always on my side, but college was the first time we couldn’t communicate like that.

Now, it may seem a bit dramatic when I say it like that, but my brother and I were in different time zones with very different schedules. He is an early bird; I am a night owl. Most of his lectures took place in the morning, while a majority of mine were in the afternoon. He spent afternoons studying, and I spent evenings at club meetings or fulfilling club responsibilities. He spent any limited free time he had scheduling in long runs to keep up with his training, while I spent my limited free time trying to manage my mental health problems.

Our schedules just didn’t match, and we started to drift apart. Now, I know most people would probably just say that it’s a part of life to grow apart from your siblings when you go off to college and grow older, but anyone who knows my brother and I knows that we’re overachievers, perfectionists, if you will. We weren’t going to let the inability to find matching times to Facetime, Skype, or even call each other get in the way of our relationship.

So, during fall break, my brother went out and bought a couple stamps, came back and told me we were going to write each other letters. From then on, we would send each other a letter every week. Every week, we took turns coming up with prompts and we saved the stories and shenanigans for when we would meet up in person. We ended up writing about all sorts of silly things from what our current song obsession was to what kind of fish we wished we could be.

And it’s really been incredible how much closer I feel to my brother once we’ve started exchanging letters like this. It’s not the same as texting where I can instantly reach my brother, but there’s a certain warmth to knowing that he has set aside 15 minutes a week to think through sharing another aspect of himself with me and vice versa. These letters, they aren’t important information that we’re exchanging, but with the way I am able to see my brother’s thoughts in his own handwriting once a week, I feel like I got to spend actual time with him. The best part of writing letters is that they are physical reminders of our relationship that we get to keep for all of time. I’m not sure about my brother, but I know I definitely reread his letters whenever I’m feeling down or struggling.

As cliche as it sounds, there’s really nothing like receiving a handwritten letter from someone you care about. So go forth, send write a letter to your grandmother, you parents, your siblings, your best friend from childhood that you’ve lost touch with.

I know they’ll appreciate it greatly.