DeAngelo Williams
Mrs. Randall
English 1102
20Apirl 2013
Finning a means of communication In today’s society, we have become more pre-occupied in our everyday lives with things such as work, school, and family. Sometimes we even have what seems like no time for anyone, not even those we love and care about. There is a rather shocking lack of communication between people in our rapidly advancing generation. In Paul Dooley and Winnie Holzman’s play Post-Its (Notes on a Marriage), we watch as two young people who are in love and newly married, begin to leave each other post its notes when they have no time for communication with one another. The author successfully tells an amazing love story using a unique means of communication. According to Anne Maydan Nicotera, “communication is critical to inter-personal relationships” (Nicotera). The notes vary from topics such as one not wanting to wake the other as they leave early for work, for tasks that need to be completed throughout the day. The audience, through the reading of the post- its notes views the couple’s life as it goes through the early stages of a relationship, to having a child, to a downhill slide of their relationship, the steady reconstruction of a marriage, and eventually it goes on until one of the two passes on. By leaving these post-its notes, the unnamed couple manages to have a basis of communication upon which they both are able to agree upon. They manage to find a convenient and effective way to convey what they need to say to one another through post-its notes, and even though things get rough, and arguments ensue, they find their strength and return to one another. Their relationship is refound with a clean slate, and although there are occasional spats in the notes, the audience can see that their relationship is much easier once they settled their problems and sought help. “According to USA today, 25 percent of Americans have no one to confide in” (Kornblum). This means that one fourth of Americans have no one whom they trust to be intimate with, which is extremely sad. In their new stronger relationship they still have issues, but their ability to understand each other has grown exponentially. Without establishing this important means of communication their relationship would have never worked out. Many couples enter into relationships having no idea that communication would be a problem. Couples with bad means of communication often have dysfunctional relationships and end up separating. For example, couples that do not communicate pay less attention to each other, which will leave the couple clueless on what the other individual wants. Fortunately, the unnamed couple find their own special way of communicating with each other to keep their relationship striving. Not only does the communication occur between the man and his wife, it also forms a connection with the audience as well. Instead of a typical acted out play where the audience is simply watching events play out, instead the author gives a show where the actors are reading off of note cards and nothing more. This form and style pulls the audience into the life of the couple. It draws upon the viewer’s imagination to recreate the events that are taking place with the writer of the most recent note. The viewer builds a connection with both of the writers of the notes due to the fact that the everyday subjects matter to the people in the audience watching the show. People find it easy to put themselves into the characters shoes. This can very well be related to what the audience see through-out their everyday life. It is more believable and real to the audience because the situations are what most couples go through. The members of the audience can easily relate to this unnamed couple by the dialect and the tone of the story. For example, during the play on the post-its note the couple was mentioning getting some “milk” through-out the play, but neither of them ever did. This leads to irony at the end of the play when the husband finally got the milk, but it was too late. In this case, communication is very important, because no one ever knows when the people they care about the most are going to die.
“Call Emily. Also cousin Ruthie. Send note to Father Mckay and everyone who sent flowers. (Beat.) The service was lovely. Everybody said so. (Beat.) I was looking through your things for that locket you said Eugenia should have. I could hardly believe what I found. You’d saved every Post-it I ever wrote you. I wish I’d saved yours. I could be reading them now. (Beat.) Back soon. Going to the store. We need milk.”(Dooley)

“There’s a pause as lights slowly fade on the Actress. Then…” (Dooley) The audience realizes that the actress has passed away. When the actor was searching for a locket for his daughter he discovered his late wife post-its notes; realizing this, he wishes he would have held on to his as well. It is speculated that he felt some sense of guilt for not keeping the post-its notes she wrote to him because if he would have died first she would have had something to remember him by. This moment reminded him of the importance of communication, and he reflected on all the post-its notes him and his late wife exchanged on a daily basis. This communication was the fabric that kept his relationship tightly sewed together. The post-its notes kept the couple relationship strong, without the post-its note the couple would have had little chemistry in their relationship. This is the point in the play when the audience realizes that communication is key element that many couples need to maintain a healthy relationship. Many people can benefit from this lesson regardless of what kind of relationship they may happen to be in at the moment.
Communication is very important no matter what involvement one may have with another person. Without some form of communication we as people are lost and not just in a relationship sense. People desire contact or communication of some form; it is just how they are. The fact that the couple uses something as simple as post-it notes to talk to one another may seem odd to many, but it is an effective way for the pair to tell one another things that are going on with them. Every person has to find their own means of communication that works for them. The unnamed couple also remind themselves to call, talk, or leave the other person a note and that shows that they also rely on the notes for self communication. By finding a means to solve a problem that occurs often with many people, the couple does manage to use the notes as a way to strengthen their relationship, even though it seems that the relationship is going to end. People need to learn to respect each other and appreciate that even the simplest means of communication is better than none at all. More people should take the time to find a way to communicate effectively with one another, even if it is something as simple as the post-its notes, maybe life would become a little more bearable in a sense.

Works cited
Dooley, Paul. "Post-its (Notes on a Marriage)." Trans. Array Compact Literature. Karen Mauk. 8th. Boston,MA: Wadsworth Cengage Learning, 1202-1206. Print.
Nicotera, Anne . nterpersonal communication in friend and mate relationships. SUNY Press, 1993. 134. eBook. <http://books.google.com/books/about
Kornblum, Janet . "Study: 25% of Americans have no one to confide in." (2006): n.pag. USA today. Web. 25 Apr 2013. <http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/nation/2006-06-22-friendship_x.htm>.