I am a digital-first, embrace technology, “find an app for that” millennial. I welcome modern ways to do and experience everyday tasks. I buy tickets online, order pizza from an app, get my news from Twitter, keep myself on task via an electronic calendar, communicate in emojis, text myself reminders, and the list goes on and on.

However, I can count four ways — wait, I mean three ways, I don’t read a physical newspaper anymore — that I am still old school. Not wanting to hold you up on one of the longest days of the year, let me very briefly (and this time I mean it) tell you the three ways I am still old fashioned.

I still send snail mail — a lot. I write notes of simple correspondence, send birthday cards, and even pay bills via the U.S. Postal Service. I enjoy keeping postal workers employed so much that I once even offered my readers a chance to receive a personal card from their favorite blogger. That turned out to be an expensive blog post! Nothing beats checking the mailbox and actually receiving something of value. Even with the recent increase in first class postage (a stamp is now a whopping 49 cents), I won’t be changing this outdated practice anytime soon.

I send a lot of stuff from this mailbox.

Believe it or not, I still go to the library. With e-books, online newspapers, and so many digital news/entertainment sources out there, you could read from your iPhone all day long. Heck, you could read from it over the course of 100 different lifetimes. Why go check something out? Seriously, what is a library anyway? Ahhhh, what a shame. For those who don’t visit libraries, I feel sorry for you. There is no place cozier than your community public library. The resources available are too good to pass up. It is public service at its best. Finding a gem at the library is just different from stumbling upon an article on your phone. Sidney and I are committed to raising Sloan in a way that leaves no doubt about the magic of the library.

Some of my library cards.

Lastly, I still visit Walgreens and CVS to make photo prints. With file transfers, social media, and photo sharing sites, many people these days strictly keep their photos in the digital realm. Sure, more folks are going to see and react to a photo that is on Facebook, but that doesn’t take away the feeling of physically holding a print you care about. I print off 4×6 prints like they are going out of style. I send them off in cards to relatives, use them to decorate our refrigerator, and keep them stashed away in case the internet ever shuts down.

A look at one side of our refrigerator.

Call me a new school guy with some old school tendencies. I might be a digital marketer with an appreciation for technology, but I haven’t completely turned my back on the way things used to be done. Don’t Blink.