Saturday, February 7, 2009

An old email being delivered years later - uh oh?

A past president forwarded to me an email that I sent to him several years ago, that arrived in his email box this week. He had not seen it before.

It could be that it was stuck in a server this long, someone could be in an archived email location and accidentally sent it (along with other emails), or maybe it was just out there in cyberspace waiting to be delivered. Nonetheless, it's four years late.

Reminds me of those made-for-TV movies where (postal) letters get lost somewhere and are delivered many years later -- and they end up changing someone's life. At least on television, those letters delivered years later may include a declaration of love, location of wealth, explanation of big family secret or the like. I'd have to assume there is some of that sent by email too.

Few thoughts:
1. Email really never is gone for good.
2. Sometimes email does get delivered late - really late.
3. An email can get lost forever. If you never got a response to something important, consider the possibility that it was never delivered.

This particular email was only asking about a speaker for a designation program, nothing life changing. But it would have been more interesting otherwise. Maybe next time.

1 comment:

Valerie said...

Wild things are happening... I just got half a dozen emails myself that were sent no less than 6 months ago.