Package-filler postcards deserve some attention, too

I bought a cute postcard of a hedgehog on eBay so that I could mail it to a fellow Postcrossing user in Vilnius, Lithuania, who loves hedgehogs and ice hockey. When the hedgehog postcard arrived, it was protected in the envelope between two used postcards. 

Obviously, it's good to protect the items you're mailing, and I can understand that, if you're a postcard dealer and have a bunch of them around, it's cheaper to use them in packaging than cardboard. Still, it made me a little sad that think that these are just unwanted postcards, serving as filler that's expected to be thrown away.

I won't throw them away, of course. I'll find a way to use them or pass them along to another postcard collector who might appreciate them. Because every piece of paper tells a story, right? 

Pictured above are the fronts and backs of the two postcards that protected my hedgehog. The top one shows a beautiful pastoral setting in Almelo, Netherlands. It was mailed in 1968. If anyone wants to translate the full cursive Dutch message, please do so in the comments. (I did make out the phrase alles goed en gezond — "everything good and healthy.")

The bottom postcard features another peaceful scene, this one in Zwolle, Netherlands, parts of which date to the Bronze Age. From Wikipedia, I learned that residents of Zwolle are called Blauwvingers; that Zwolle is partly known for a historic district of Art Nouveau buildings; and that Hein Boele, the actor who provides the voices for the Dutch versions of Elmo and Gobo Fraggle, was born in Zwolle. So there's your story from that piece of ephemera.