My mail looks pretty much the same each week: bills, sales flyers, a couple of magazines. But this weekend was a bit different. Hidden in the middle of the usual stack of catalogs and envelopes there was a postcard from Taiwan and one from Finland.

About a month ago, at the urging of a friend that I met through flickr.com, I signed up for postcrossing.com. The premise is simple: Send postcards out from your hometown, and in turn receive them from all over the world.

There are people from 180 countries participating. And it's simple to do so after registering with the site: As a sender, you simply request an address from the system and send a postcard out. As a recipient, you wait to receive a postcard, then register it online. (Each postcard that you send and receive will have a code and the system tracks how far the postcard traveled and how long the journey took.) On April 11, the one millionth postcard was registered in the system.

Running to the mailbox each day reminds me of being in the second grade and having my first pen pal. Back then I couldn't wait to see what fun stamp would come on my next letter from her. And today, I can only guess what country my next postcard is coming from, what beautiful images of their country the sender has chosen to share, and what my new friend's handwriting looks like.