letter – Superman found his phone booth

Day 17… a letter to my friends as a whole

I have really gotten off track on the whole 30 letters in 30 days but it is still very therapeutic to write these.

Dear Friends:

There are 3 types of friends. The Facebook friend: a friend who you keep in contact with after you or they leave a job and their life interests you enough to follow them. This category also includes the high school classmate because us Baby Boomers (I’m the last year but it counts) didn’t have social media back then and we, of course, we lost touch. We follow each other to see what each other is doing and to know when one of us dies.

The second type of friend is the actual friend. Someone who has been to your house, met your family, has answered the phone and been there for you when you needed something. You all share some type of memory with me.

The third type of friend is the “3 AM friend”. Just as it sounds, if we called each other at 3 AM and needed anything it was just done. This is a short but important list. If you are on mine then you are special.

To all of you, I want to ask you to bear with me. I have moved much farther away and getting together is more difficult. Driving to get-togethers is simply too much driving for me. I won’t be seeing you much.

But that doesn’t mean that I have forgotten about you. I am still here for you and if it is within my ability I will help you in any way that I can. Even just to talk.

If you are indeed my friend, you will know that my theory of friendship is no matter how much time elapses, we pick up where we left off. I plan on letting all of you know just how much you mean to me. Just give me time.

Day 16…a letter to my family

To my Family:

This coming Thursday is Thanksgiving. It is one of my favorite holidays. It was always one of the three days of the year that we sat down as a family for a meal. Because of your mother and I’s career choices, the family dinner was never a part of our family routine.

Every Thanksgiving in recent memory has typically been a stressful letdown in some fashion. Mom would decline her mother’s invite to her beautiful condo and an amazing spread because her mother “stresses her out”. The end result would be you not seeing your grandmother on a holiday. I would wake up early and get the bird in the oven and prep everything else for the meal. Mom could be counted on to yell instructions that I didn’t need from the bedroom without getting out of bed. Once she did get up she would criticize the way I did everything. Kids, you would be in the living room trying not to notice the rising tensions in the kitchen as I simply tried to be a good dad and make a nice meal. You knew Mom was aggravating me but you don’t dare to say anything for fear of setting her off. Thankfully, the guests still willing to come to our house will arrive and everyone will act cordial.

Appetizers would be served, I would pour the first of many cocktails that I would consume that day. Mom would be busy trying to be nice to my mother, who has never been anything but nice to Mom. I would poke my head into the living room periodically to see how everyone is doing while the meal progressed. When the turkey came out of the oven, we would gather everyone to the table and sit.

You kids would start eating until I remind you to wait. We never ate together as a family, and never said Grace so it’s not your fault. You just forgot that your mother would insist that we all go around the table and say what we are thankful for. When it is my turn, you will all make fun in anticipation of mine because one year I made the mistake of being sincere and loving and was mercilessly teased about it.

We would all eat too fast and run out of awkward conversation too soon. You kids would leave the table before I wanted you to, my fault for wanting to savor the rare moment of having all of you together and in front of me. Mom would have a panic attack on dishes and start cleaning the kitchen. The remaining of us would nurse our cocktails or coffees then retire to watch football.

If I was able to get this far without Mom telling me to “go fuck myself” about something then I was in the clear. She was full and content and it would be at least an hour before she started complaining about how fat she was.

The rest of the day would be smooth. Our guests would leave and we would all go our separate ways.

That is how most Thanksgivings went. Incredibly, I wish this year will be the same.

This year we will be at a restaurant because we don’t have a home together anymore. We haven’t been together as a family in almost a year. We will get a big table. Mom and I will pretend to get along and awkwardly smile over our wine glasses knowing that we just talked about divorce but we aren’t going to tell you kids about it yet. We will have a great meal and then go off in three different directions.

This is our life now. Everyday life is hard enough. Holidays just suck.

I wish more than anything that things were different. That we were the happy family that I always wanted. I am thankful that I have such a wonderful relationship with you, my children even though our family dynamic stinks. Maybe you know, maybe you don’t but I stayed for 10 more years, and holiday seasons, than I ever thought possible just to extract as much joy as I could from them.

My happiness will never matter as much to me as yours. I hope that your memories of our time together will include some happy ones, that your idea of family is a healthy one despite your own experiences. If you have good memories then I will have succeeded as a husband and father.

Day 15… A letter to my community

Dear small New England Town:

There was a time when this town was my only vacation outlet. As a child, I spent every weekend of the summer here. We had a campsite in one of the campgrounds right on the banks of the lake. I spent some of the best times of my life in that campground. Sun-soaked days on the lake, campfires at night. I learned to do so many things and made so many friends. I fondly remember the excitement of everyone showing up at the beginning of the season after a long winter. Anticipating the fun ahead. Bittersweet memories of late summer nights, lying in the field and gazing at the stars knowing that the summer was almost over and school would soon start.

As I grew older, and my family moved on from a campground to a house I visited less. I was a young guy with a job, the occasional girlfriend, and friends. All of which made the 2-hour drive less desirable.

When I got married and had children we came up as often as we could. My children always loved it up here. They got to do all of the things that I did as a child. Just not as often. We were limited to day trips, and only if the weather was projected to be nice. We felt that other than the beach there is nothing to do here.

When Dad retired Mom and Dad made a life up here. They turned a small Chalet into a much larger, year-round house with a garage and a lawn. They became full-time residents here in 2001. I didn’t know how they did it. Other than the beach what was there to do here? I could never grasp the pace. With the exception of the 4th of July parade, the town seemed pretty dead.

I am now a full-time resident of this town and I will be for the foreseeable future. While I was driven here by less than ideal circumstances, I have to admit I love it here. The town is beautiful. The air is clean. The people are nice. The buildings are old. And the pace is just the way I like it.

I have come to the conclusion that my body has been breaking for a long time. I blame it on trying to maintain a pace that I am not capable of anymore. The hustle and bustle of my former life were killing me and I am not cut out for it anymore. I don’t know how I managed so long. But my new pace will extend my life.

I can’t step outside without childhood memories washing over me. When I sit by the lake I still see Dad’s smiling, tanned face as he drove the boat. Mom in tow on waterskis smiling from ear to ear. At night, I take a deep breath and savor the smell of wood-burning stoves. I still look up at the starlit sky, but now I see hope.

I will experience my first winter in this wonderful town. I am here for better or for worse. I plan on enjoying it. Getting involved in the town. I want to meet as many of the people as I can. I want to be accepted, for I am now a resident, not just a seasonal visitor.

Day 14…a letter to my favorite professor

Dear Professor “AARP”

I want to thank you for the “elective” that I stumbled over and loved the most.

It was registration day, the second half of my Junior year of college and I needed a fifth class. I saw “Geriatric Psychology” on the list of courses with openings and I thought what the hell? I registered.

Little did I know that you, the professor, were “Geriatric” as well. A very dapper, very vibrant but clearly elderly gentleman was teaching a course on the psychology of, well, himself! I knew I was in for a fun ride.

You insisted on being known as “Professor AARP”. It broke the ice a bit. You spoke to us at great length of what it is like to be old. To feel minimized, irrelevant, past one’s prime. The significance of a driver’s license and how it ties into one’s independence. Asking for help with tasks that were once easy. And on a more intimate note, you made us think about how much advancement people your age have witnessed in your lifetime. I don’t think my classmates had thought much about these things until they met you.

As far as I was concerned, you were preaching to the choir. I have always enjoyed the company of older people. As a child, my Grandparents took me frequently to their events and their friends loved me. I was fascinated by their tales, by what they had seen in their lives. I love the stories of how “it” used to be. Dating was called “courting”. They “went steady” with their favorite “gal” or “guy”. Their music. The fact that they wore suits to go the supermarket.

You were no exception. When I asked you to join me for a coffee in the cafe one day after class you said: “why do you want to hang out with an old guy like me.” I told you that I saw no such guy. We talked many times over coffee that semester. You were at the tail end of your career, bordering on retirement. This was the last time you would teach this class because it was being dropped from the curriculum. You found that very telling in and of itself. I told you how much I was enjoying it. I think it mattered to you.

It was just an elective, but you sir were not just a professor. You were a very nice man with a refreshing outlook on life that many could learn from. I can’t speak for everyone but I certainly learned a lot from you. I still, to this day have many elderly friends. I think of you often as I spend time with them. You were a friend.

I suspect that you have been gone for at least 20 years as I write this. Clearly, you made an impact on someone.

A grateful student.

Day 13…a letter to my body

Dear body:

We need to come to some kind of an understanding. We can go around and around about who started it but it doesn’t solve anything. You were broken at an early age so I gave up on you. I didn’t ask for a failing body, I didn’t inherit it. I didn’t ask for it. It just happened. So as I ate junk food, boozed and generally abused you I did it out of sheer frustration for being dealt a shit hand.

You have to admit it, eventually, I came to terms with our differences and began to treat you better. I began to feed you better food, less booze and I even exercised you.

In our 30’s I took great care of you. But you were already broken. When we were 31 we got cancer. We worked together to kick it out for good.

When we were 40 we got a staff infection that almost killed us. If not for a routine bed check on the 6^th floor we would be worm food right now. Do you know that I actually left you for 4 minutes? But some yelling doctors got us together again.

In our late 40’s you decided that you needed spare parts in order to continue running, Somehow we got you a new kidney part and you loved it. Sure you tried to reject it a couple of times, that’s normal. But I fed you drugs that made you stop. For a while you worked with me. Then you allowed the original defect to come back in the replacement part. Even after being so nice to you for 4 years you let me down again. Now we are sick again. The Dr said today that the new part only has 30% functionality left.

I am proposing a truce. If I promise to continue to give you good food, plenty of exercise and sleep will you make an effort to make that 30% last as long as possible? You see, there are so many things that I want to do and many important occasions, still unplanned but I hope to see them in my daily planner, at which my presence will be requested.

I don’t like our relationship, but I’ve come to grips with it. As I said I don’t blame you. Please work with me, consider my proposition carefully. I am sincere on my end. All I need is time. Precious time. I can think of a few people that will also be eternally grateful.

Respectfully,

The soul

Day 12 of the 30 day challenge…a letter to my future ex-wife

My wife told me this afternoon she wants to discuss getting a divorce

A letter to my wife:

That was quite a phone conversation.

I’m experiencing a lot of emotions right now. I can’t believe I wasn’t ready for you to say to me what I’ve been dreading, dare I say procrastinating saying to you. I actually thought that I was the only one thinking it. And it was killing me.

You want a divorce. An amicable, non-contested, let’s move on with our lives divorce. No harm and no foul. Why am I surprised by this?

I have agonized for months over a conversation that you brought up over the phone.

I’m sad. I wish I had done better by you. You deserve better. I warned you when you were pursuing me all those years ago that I wouldn’t be the guy you deserve.

I feel inadequate. If only you were in a better place financially. I continue to blame myself for our money woes even though I couldn’t help getting sick. You’re now broke and living with a friend. Your future looks as bad as mine.

I feel relieved. Relieved that you also recognize that this is not working nor is it going to.

I am surprised at how easy it was for you to put it out there. We were such a famous story at one time that I thought it would be harder for you.

I am grateful. Grateful that instead of blaming me you told me that I didn’t deserve what happened to me. That I was a nice guy. That I, we, deserved to be happy.

I don’t hate you. I don’t even dislike you. We spent some really good years together. Unfortunately, we spent more bad ones. Arguing over money, clichéd as it is, was the end of us. We took on too much, tried too hard to keep up with the Joneses, and then I got sick.

I love you as the mother of our 4 wonderful children, our one great success story. And I love you for all of the ways that you straightened me out as a younger, fool-hardy man. Once compatible, we grew in different directions. It doesn’t matter now which one of us is different, the fact is we have nothing in common.

I loved you enough to always honor our wedding vows. I was never unfaithful and I put you and our children first. But I don’t deserve a cookie because you have been faithful to us as well.

I need time to absorb the events of this afternoon. I agree with everything you said, I’ve thought it myself, it just feels real for the first time. You are right that we don’t live together, see each other often or even talk. And you aren’t going to keep me from seeing the kids, my biggest fear.

I hate an unhappy ending and we were a great story. But I guess it’s settled. It’s time to turn the page.

With much regrets,

Your husband

Day 11…a letter to the leader of my faith

Dear Grand Architect of the Universe:

It took most of my life and it wasn’t until I stopped looking that I found you.

When I was younger I watched my fellow humans hail you, bow to you, raise hands high in the air and shed tears to you. I tried to feel that zeal but whatever wiring those people had, I didn’t. Frustrated, I walked away thinking that you weren’t there.

I denied you for years. I never reached out to you even when under life’s heaviest bombardment. I decided you didn’t exist and I was not going to be a hypocrite.

I couldn’t believe that you could allow so many bad people to thrive, so many good people to suffer and let a baby get Cancer. At least not the kindly Gentleman with the flowing robe and white beard I was taught to visualize.

I lashed out at your believers. I felt that they were selfish, only asking things for themselves, for their own advancement. What do you care who wins a baseball game after all? I decided that it was fine for people to believe in you if it makes them feel better but you weren’t for me.

Eventually, I came to realize that I believed in evil. To believe in one you must believe in the other. I further recognized that things are just a little too perfect to just be the result of a random cosmic explosion. Finally, I decided that if I cannot prove you are not there then it is very possible that you are. I closed my eyes, opened my ears and sought evidence of your existence.

I became a member of the world’s oldest fraternity 6 years ago. Freemasonry requires that a man has a belief in a higher power. They do not require a particular deity or denomination. Freemasons refer to you as the GAOTU, Grand Architect of the Universe. I joined Freemasonry as a step in building meaning in my life, it naturally followed that such a desire would incorporate Spirituality. I was looking not only for the meaning of life but for meaning in my life.

I started slow. When others prayed, I meditated. I took that time to think positive thoughts about others and reflect on what I have lost and changes I need to make. I spent time with men of faith and found that these good men used their belief in you to help others, not themselves. I found their positive approach to life as a portal to allow you into my life. Now I am completely open to what you have in store for me.

As my personal life has deteriorated, my family life has collapsed and my health has declined, you have become more apparent to me. Not because my need for you has, but because of my awareness of how much I appreciate what I still have. I do not question you for what is happening to me, I hope that you will help guide those that I love in my absence and that you will guide me in my goal of becoming a humble, grateful and kind person.

I find myself outdoors a lot now. I am able to stare at the woods for hours on end taking in the beauty of nature. I see you in the industrious squirrel foraging desperately before winter. I see you in the bluebird flitting from branch to branch. I see you in the ripple of water on the lake as I paddle my Kayak. I see you in the mountain ranges on a sunny fall day, in the smile of a child and in the affection of a dog.

Yesterday morning I left the house early, dreading the doctor’s appointment I was heading to. I looked at the end of my driveway and saw a baby doe with its mother standing looking at me.

There you were.

Day 10…a letter to the leader of the Country

Dear Mr. President:

You are perhaps the most amazing story in political history. Your election shook the world. It was historic on so many levels and the shock waves still ripple across the world one full year after your election.

On election night I watched the results unfold with unbridled glee. Not because I was supporting you, (I did in the same manner as every other election I have voted in, I voted against a candidate, not for one), but because of the sheer excitement of it. I felt vindicated because I predicted your victory when no one in my circle did. I simply knew that the polls were not accurate. That many who were polled either gave no answer or lied. for fear that supporting you would cause them backlash or social condemnation. Therefore the numbers that predicted a Hillary victory were simply not accurate and the “silent majority” would speak with their vote, not their voice. As I sat on the edge of my seat I embraced the tumult that then unfolded.

Of course, I didn’t realize the chaos that would ensue. The reaction from the pundits was hilarious and expected. While required to maintain an “objective” expression they failed miserably, they couldn’t contain their anger at your election. No surprises there for me. But the country itself did surprise me and continues to do so. College students felt violated and clamored tearfully for “safe spaces”. Grown men and women cried in public and called for the immediate disbanding of long-standing election protocols. In short, millions of people lost their fucking minds when their candidate didn’t win. It is a sad state of affairs but it is very telling of the mindset of our country. Our youth is unaccustomed to not getting their way, our adults have lost the ability of reasonable discourse, and our country is hopelessly divided. If you do an absolutely amazing job in the next three years your popularity will never exceed 50%. Fortunately, you don’t care about any of that.

Mr. President, you were elected by a lot of people who didn’t agree with the direction the previous administration was going. They didn’t necessarily vote for you, but for the issues that you stood for and that, let’s face it you were a lesser evil to many. You are not an ideal candidate. You are not Presidential in the way you carry yourself. You are crass, you can be a braggart, you are not well-spoken and you are impulsive in your words and actions. I can only speak for myself, but I thought your competitor was corrupt, while I only find you imperfect. I compromised a lot of my personal convictions to vote for you in hopes that you will grow into the job.

As the country still reels from your win, and as your critics and enemies pull out every stop to destroy you please remember that you hold the most powerful position in the free world. If I love my country I cannot possibly in good conscience want you to fail. That would be commensurate to hoping the pilot of my aircraft will fail. Do what you said you would do, fulfill your promises because that is integrity. Please also remember that with integrity comes the ability to absorb criticism, be civil to your detractors and to act upright at all times. The insolent temper tantrums, name-calling, and dick-measuring need to stop. It is not, whether you care about this or not, representative of your office. Even if I didn’t respect you, you sit in the chair that many great men have before you. Act like it.

The country is not broken, but it is cracking. Everything you do can either help fix or further the damage. I’m counting on you. Put the damn twitter account away and charge forward.

A concerned citizen.

Day 9…A letter to my parents

A letter to my parents

This is a difficult letter to write. Mom, you are here to read it. Dad, you don’t get to hear this but I sure wish you could. If what I have been raised to believe is true, that spirits live on, then maybe you are aware of the things I have said to your stone. You know, the things I wish I had said when you were alive.

I have no complaints. Dad, you would laugh at that and say “oh good” but hear me out. A lot of people my age complain about their parents. They say they wish they had gotten more of this, less of that, etc. This comes in many forms; they wish they had more money, more TV’s, more vacations. They wish they had less curfews, rules, siblings, after-school activities. The list goes on. And this gives a foundation for blame. Did you know that I grew up lower -middle class? Well I did. And I didn’t know it and I didn’t care. It wasn’t until I had another friend’s house, dinner, Television or car to compare it to that I even gave it a thought. Those are just things. All I know is that I never needed anything. If I was to compare it to what my children had you would think that I was poor growing up. In reality I was just fine.

Things don’t validate the childhood, the “adult you” validates the childhood.

Dad, you came from a hard scrabble background. You were poor. Plastic on the windows and dirt floors poor. You learned early on, unlike your siblings, that hard work was the means to self-improvement and your only way out. Everything you had you worked hard for and you cared for those things and made them last. From you I learned so many things that I carry with pride; to work hard and ask no one for anything, to always remember where you came from, be yourself if people don’t like you it’s their problem, that things always work out. You were a dedicated father and you did everything you could to give me a better childhood than yours.

Mom, you survived a near-fatal childhood disease. Your life was saved by an experimental medication regimen. Your mother was a very proper woman with a too-high regard for appearances and a fleeting sense of humor. Your father a properly grounded hard-working but fun-loving WW2 veteran with a huge heart. Your little brother tragically died at the age of 4. Your mother had a tragic series of miscarriages. You became their whole world. Your mother was overbearing. You feared to do the same to me. I always thought you had high expectations of me to pick myself and dust myself off when I was hurt, I now know that you didn’t want to smother and shelter me like your mother did. Your light-hearted approach to life always kept me grounded. I could talk to you about anything and you were the perfect comic sidekick to Dad’s straight man. Your laugh is still infectious, you are sometimes silly. But you are tough, your ability to bounce back from anything has inspired me.

You were a great team. Your loyalty to each other was unlike any I had seen. I saw the way you looked at each other and I wish that I had experienced a relationship as loving. It still breaks my heart how disappointed Dad was on your 49^th anniversary, he was very sick and predicted (correctly) that he would not get to dance with her on the 50^th. He cried that day.

I learned so much from both of you and I credit you for giving me something that I see lacking in today’s world. Values. Thank you for being everything that I value in life; honest, caring, and genuine. Let there be no doubt, you did a fine job.

Your loving son

Day 8 of the 30 day challenge…a letter to a product/company

Dear Candy industry:

Please don’t think that I don’t know what you are up to.

You are not doing it for health reasons.

You are not doing it to address the National Obesity and Diabetes epidemic.

You are not fooling anyone.

You are shrinking your product’s serving sizes and you need to stop. The “share size” peanuts M & M’s is what fat fucks like me call ONE serving. And there is absolutely nothing fun about excitedly opening a Snicker’s “Fun Size” and seeing a serving the size of a squirrel turd. What’s next, will we open the package and I’ll get a whiff of chocolate smelling air?

Please, for the love of God remember who made you. Fat kids who wanted to eat their problems away. I will monitor my own blood sugar thank you very much.

I thank you for your consideration in this matter,

A longtime fan