With a pen and colorful stationary in hand, Ka Yun Cheng, 26, sits on a her front porch in San Francisco on a cool afternoon, writing one of many letters that she mails to upstate New York. The contents of this letter exude the pain of going to a new high school, in a new place, at the wrong time.

After leaving a small group of friends behind in New York, Cheng is now faced with the uncomfortable reality of trying to fit in. At her favorite spot on the porch, she begins to pour her frustrations and feelings of isolation out on paper to her friend, Wingki Yip. Her hand and pen bring a release that staring at a computer screen could never do, and with no one to really talk to, writing letters is Cheng’s only help through the hard transition of adolescence.

The enormous wave of technological inventions is threatening to swallow all communication in the 21st century. According to a study done by the Radicati Group, a Palo Alto research firm in the telecommunications industry, there are over 1.2 billion active e-mail accounts worldwide, which would cause speculation over the letter becoming a dying art. But it is the passionate letter writers like Cheng who are standing their ground with old-fashioned handwritten correspondence.

“The more technology surrounds me, the more I want to get away from it,” Cheng says.

She is keeping the computer at arm’s length by continuing contact with a friend from Chinese grade school in New York City via stationary. The letter writing began at age 9 and almost 17 years later, Cheng is still licking a stamp and dropping her friend a letter in the mail. They have not seen each other since they were 13-year-olds, when Cheng moved with her family to California, but they refused to transition to email.

“I understand her identity and she, me,” says Cheng of her pal, Yip.

More than just a mode of communication, writing has become a part of Cheng. Throughout the years she has acquired a collection of pens, ink, stationary and paper.

According to another dedicated writer of pen and hand, Angela Boyle, 26, believes letters are a good way to break up the monotony of life. She stays in contact with about ten relatives and friends regularly through the mail. With a collection of paper and cards Boyle is proud of, she is fervent about staying an old-fashioned girl at heart by fighting the pressure from friends to jump on the fast track. They tease and make fun of her inability to simply click the send button on a keyboard.

“Friends that I have who are my own age wonder why I write letters,” says Boyle.

Steve Stinson, 24, an art major at S.F. State, hasn’t written a letter since 1998.

“E-mail is so convenient and I don’t have to mess with mailing something,” says Stinson.

He doesn’t think e-mail is less personal, but just much faster and handy when it comes to keeping in contact with family and friends. Stinson communicates with loved ones through e-mail, and for him it even wins over the picking up the phone.

Standing her ground, Boyle is emphatic that getting a letter in the mailbox makes her day, and is convinced that she should try and do the same for someone else.

When a pen and paper just won’t do, Boyle begins to pound out a note to a friend, key by key. As collector of vintage typewriters from the 1930s and 1940s, her favorite is a black Underwood from the 1940s with round, white keys and a polished silver return bar. Since she uses very old typewriters, it takes even more time to type a letter, because of the effort in pushing down each key. She likes the unusual look of a typed letter and thinks of it as a special treat for the receiver of her creations.

In the irony of her craft, Boyle explains that it is not odd to receive an e-mail from the recipients, thanking her for the nice card or letter. This does not stop her from going the extra mile, by sitting down and intentionally writing a friend a letter or typing out a card on one of her unique typewriters.

Years later, Cheng watches from her favorite square table, as customers flow in and out of the teahouse while she begins to write Yip a letter. In college, Cheng is overwhelmed with trying to juggle school as well as starting her own business as a wedding photographer.

She begins to spill all of her concerns and struggles out onto the stationary, a connection that Cheng never feels with the cold interaction of an e-mail. Without a desk of her own, she frequents the shop regularly, in search of a quiet place to write, while also enjoying the conversations with the man selling tea. He shares her passion for good pens.

“You're investing time into something very valuable,” Cheng says of her letters.

Now it is common to find Cheng at her yellow secretary desk, dipping one of her glass pens into a small pool of black ink trying to sort out the mess of thoughts in her head. She pulls out a piece of Chinese style paper that Yip bought her last Christmas and begins to write a letter. Cheng pours out her thoughts into words on a page mentioning her recent break up as well as her thoughts on graduating from grad school, all the while feeling a relief. This is her habit and a way to devote time into a physical display of care.

Pushing aside the computer or laptop, the few devoted will keep on pursuing their craft of the letter while trying to convince those around them of the importance of the handwritten connection. Cheng is sure that she will continue her letters to her childhood friend and Boyle is definitely going to continue to add her personal touch to the envelopes she sends out, with no expectation of finding one in return. For these women it is not so much about the message their letters carry, but the heart and passion behind the creation of the art.