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CHATHAM – The 1956 marriage of Carol Robert’s sister led to a pen-pal friendship that has stretched across more than 60 years and finally reached an in-person milestone on Sunday.
Robert’s new brother-in-law, Jim Toler from West Virginia, told her his brother had a daughter named Chyrl who would like to be her pen pal.
About 68 years after this friendship through correspondence began in 1956, Robert finally met Chyrl Butler face-to-face for the first time on Sunday in Chatham-Kent, where Robert lives.
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“It feels great,” Butler, who lives in Maine, said of meeting Robert and her daughter, Chyrl Roelans.
When asked if it feels like they already know each other, Robert said: “We do. I feel I’ve known her forever.”
Robert was 11 and Butler was nine when they started corresponding. Over the years they shared life experiences, particularly about children and family.
When asked why she named her daughter Chyrl with same rare spelling as her pen pal, Robert said: “At that time we were writing back and forth a lot. I just kind of liked the name and I said, ‘C-h-y-r-l that’s different,’ so that’s what happened.”
Life seemed to get in the way of prior times Robert and Butler planned to meet over the years. Also as life became busy, the correspondence between the two came and went.
But Roelans saw Butler on Facebook and asked her mom if that is who she is named after. So Roelans contacted Butler a number of years ago through social media and a reconnection was made.
A friendship has formed between Roelans and Butler as they share issues they encounter with the spelling of Chyrl.
“It’s a nightmare with our name, it really is,” Butler said with a laugh.
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She chimed off numerous names she’s been called along with the mispronunciations of her name. She said people often insisted on switching the ‘r’ and the ‘y’ in the spelling of her name.
“People would say: You don’t have a vowel in your name,” Butler said. “And I’ll say: Yes, ‘A-E-I-O-U and sometimes Y. I’m sometimes Y.’”
Roelans said she tells people who question the spelling of her name: “The ‘y’ is in the middle . . . and they still don’t get it.”
She often encounters difficulties with the spelling at government offices, and has even been told her name is spelled wrong.
Butler confessed her mother got the name Chyrl from a story that appeared in the old True Story magazine.
Now that they were together for the first time, their plans were to visit, have dinner and catch up. But they were not divulging any details.
“We’re not telling you all the personal stuff,” Robert said with a laugh.
eshreve@postmedia.com
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