dear editor
|
skip
...the first stumbling steps, Mr. Nice's letter, shy smiles, a bit of begging, a lot of hope - actually a blind shot. Shot to a few tens of editors selected from an editors' addresses book. As is obvious - written while I was still in Scitex. Clearly a beginner's (not that it matters) style.
|
|
C. Press
1 November 1993
Dear Mr. W,
I always wanted to read an extraordinary book about ordinary people. It exists but is hard to find.
The non fiction manuscript I want to tell you about is not extraordinary either. But it surely is (in my own biased opinion) different and it surely is about ordinary people. About me. This is my own ascent and descent "autobiography" as seen through my many memorandums and letters sent internally. The special aspect about it is the passion, pun and fun with which I wrote factual letters, and which accordingly got me the full range of responses - from compliments to threats. The chapters in the book are the years passed, from 1981 to 1992. There are three main phases in the "action" development: 1 - the technical oriented memos of the beginning; 2 - the liveliness of the caring, pushing and being part of the system; 3 - the approaching end of the "good times". None of the material is confidential.
The book is written in a funny style, sprinkled with an ongoing mathematical quiz, funny breakpoints, and a special crossword.
The company for which I work and which is the subject of the book is Scitex, the biggest manufacturer of Digital Image Processing equipment for repro and publishing houses.
Attached you'll find samples from the manuscript for you to judge. In case you want the full manuscript I will send it to you.
Sincerely,
|
|
skip
...it's only three years later that I renewed my efforts, three years of personal upheavals and company upheavals; actuall downheavals would be a better term. Having left meantime my company Scitex, I could try a more boisterous approach, and actually had also a much better product by now. Nevertheless, the Mr/Ms Editors were the same, as you might guess. So this time I tried it in a different way - free spirited? funny? somewhwere in between. Do you think it helped? C'mon, you know it didn't, they had to keep on feeding their hungry slush pile mouths. And I was probably just too good a fodder to waste it elsewhere.
|
|
H. Publishing
22 June 1996
Dear Editor,
Only a handful of publishers in the new (1996) WRITER's HANDBOOK guide got the honour of being granted my personal two stars rating. While this is hardly, at best, worth more than the ink on the first page of this letter in the local Stock exchange market, it allowed me at least to narrow down the list of publishing houses I should approach with my masterpiece. Well, it is of course for you to judge how much masterpiecing there is, if at all. I do hope that you'll find at least a glimmer of it, just enough to persuade you to accept it for publishing, and give a chance to a starting and promising career. The key words that placed undeniable luring temptation in your courtyard are of course - "unsolicited mss welcome", not to mention the undeniable magnetism of "no synopses". Since synopsizing is hardly applicable to what I'm peddling around, I may be given a real chance here. Is this my lucky day?
Did I break the ice? Hopefully. So if I'm allowed by now to move to a bit of a more serious style - please let me start with a general description of what it is that I am selling here. It is actually a non-fiction "memography" (more about it later) about not so insignificant me in the quite significant Scitex organization. Scitex, as you may know already, is the leading supplier in the Colour pre-Press and Digital Image Processing market, supplying editing/scanning/image-setting/proofing machines to thousands of colour trade-shops, printers, publishers, newspapers and similar organizations world wide. Some key English users you will surely recognize are The Independent, The Daily Mirror, The European and The Financial Times newspapers, Wace group companies, Marconi electronics. Just to mention some world wide names - The Herald Tribune newspaper in France, Time magazine in the US. Competition includes Crosfield (UK) and Agfa.
If you ask yourself by now if I'm in the business of marketing Scitex to you - no, I am not. Actually, six months ago I was fired. And it is relevant to tell you that it was done for all the wrong reasons, at the top of my career, in an ugly - even dirty, mind you - way. And it is through my book and through my eyes that I am telling the Scitex story. Not vindictively, god forbid. The book, in its major part, was ready already about two years ago. But what I allowed myself to do now is to spell names much clearer, to be more objective in my sharp remarks, and of course - to add the extra last moments period in the crudest possible way.
You are in the business for the money - why should it interest you? For the money of course. It may not become a best-seller, thus joining thousands of others, yet it may. It speaks to the hearts of the millions of technical personnel, engineers and managers that strive to advance their companies' interests through personal belief, hard work and sacrifice, only to be thrown later to Mammon's dogs. It speaks to the thousands of Scitex customers that are dying to have a glimpse at the internal workings of their monopolistic supplier, at the endless manipulations of facts, truths, equipment releases, problems treatment. It speaks to the thousands of direct and indirect Scitex workers world wide presently fearing for their future, and wondering about the killing of a living legend - if you don't mind me quoting them when referring to me. It speaks to Scitex's competitors for similar reasons. And it speaks to hundreds of thousands of Israelis for which Scitex is a symbol of international success about to become a resounding failure symbol.
Why do I call it a "memography"? Because it is a biography based entirely on my internally written memos - chasing, fighting, living for the day caring for the morrow, highly appreciated and much feared all through the company. And not dry ones, by no means, rather memos filled with pun, with fun, with passion and with pain. With short interconnecting passages to ensure an action like fluency. And to make it all the more readable it is sprinkled with (I am an engineer by profession) an ongoing mathematical quiz, funny breakpoints, and a special crosswords puzzle.
I am no marketing expert, but I believe that channels for distribution should include, yet not be limited to, at least professional magazines, the Scitex Users Association, the Service Managers Association, major book outlets in Israel, and financial weekend supplements of business newspapers and major Israeli newspapers (Israel is a small country - everybody wants to know everything about everybody else, especially when a smell of scandal is attached to it). In any case - you are the experts in these matters, you'll lead and I'll follow.
Please allow me a few last words before you fall asleep. About two years ago I tried to publish this manuscript, in an earlier form, in the US. I failed. It was quite fortunate actually, since due to my recent termination in Scitex, I could improve on a significant number of aspects. And I tried my luck again, with the manuscript in its new form, with an English publisher following a newspaper ad. It was accepted. With a catch, unfortunately - I have to share in the production costs. Well, as the legendary entity called virgin would have said - so what's in it for me except for a big belly and an empty stomach? As it came from a serious company it may be a genuine offer, but, between you and me - what control does one have once the costs coverage incentive (and, probably, a not insignificant up-front profit from the dying to be published author) is out of the way? The editorial evaluation used grand words such as "...a richly detailed and fascinating portrait of an interesting life..." or "...a vibrancy which brings the subject alive in the minds of the readers..." and some additional details which pointed to the fact that it was actually read. Marketing? Propaganda? Sting? I decided to prefer the real relationship - it's good you eat it, it's bad you spit it! and I truly hope I'm offering a gourmet's délice. In any case - you're the judge and you're the jury. Douze points? Give me ten and I'm delighted.
My plans ahead? Waiting for the breakthrough to embark on the real writing adventure. I believe I own the skills and the style to go for big. And I intend to. But first I have to get this one off my chest and out my way so I can joyfully snub my erstwhile bosses into admitting they cut off their nose to spite their face. The liberating key to steaming right away into the future... (...wow, what melodrama, does it come complete with hanky attached?...).
Hopefully and Sincerely yours,
PS I know it takes some time to analyse and respond, nevertheless I decided to forgo the faster wide-angle shot-gun approach in favour of the narrowly focused one. I am kindly asking for your consideration and for a reasonably fast answer; imagine connecting end-to-end a series of 3 to 6 months waiting periods from different publishers - it would be quite difficult for me to make a promising start at the age of onehundredthirtysomething...
|
skip
...I tried also a slight variation on the above theme, addressed to another sector in the publishing world. The end of the letter was similar, the beginning different.
|
|
Ms. R, P.L. International
18 July 1996
Dear Ms. R,
If to judge from my previous success/failure rate, somewhere in the nears of zero point something (and the something very near zero by itself), you are probably anyway the wrong person for me to approach. But as I decided to cover every possible venue before giving up on my quest, approaching the Graphic Arts magazines via names spied out from other information sources is the next logical step on the hot road to eternal fame or doom. And if you'll allow me the decency of at least reading the next few lines, then you are a very nice person indeed.
If you're asking yourself by now, no - you're not on Candid Camera. And what the guy signed at the end of this incoherent letter looks for, is a means to publish and distribute his masterpiece. I am not even sure you "do this kind of thing", and even how much masterpiecing there is in what I am proposing to you. It's something for you to decide. But please allow me to present my case, and worst that can happen is that you won't give a chance to a starting and promising career.
. . . . .
Hopefully and sincerely yours,
|
skip
...don't even ask, of course it didn't help, irrelevant who I sent it to. Some polite nods, some impolite "go to hell"s... I kind of started getting frustrated. Counting the weeks. Then the months. Is there a door somewhere?
And then a small wonder (or what I tought of at the time as a small wonder) happened. I got a contact name for a Books Editor (let's call him Bard Hompkin) at a newspaper (let's call it The Indeep) and I even succeeded to have a short phone call with him (wow, a phone line to God...). Following which I sent
him the next coming letter. Structured as adviced by a professional. It repeats of course some of the motifs of earlier letters, so I'll edit it just a little bit to prevent you from getting bored.
|
|
Mr. Bard Hompkin - Books Editor, The Indeep
23 April 1997
Dear Mr. Hompkin,
My name is not Stephen King.
This is my biggest problem right now, and there's nothing I can do about it. Having failed, as a result, in the official commercial channels, and having a message which I want to see thrown at the world out there, I am taking the unconventional approach of proposing my masterpiece to a newspaper. Not as a second choice, but rather as an other choice. I can see a frown building itself already in your look - "masterpiece? what masterpiece and who does this guy think he is?". Well, this guy asks only for a fair chance to state his (longish) point, and if by now I bought my ten minutes of your attention then at least I didn't waste the effort invested in writing the appropriate introduction paragraph.
Having contacted you about a week ago on the phone, I enjoy the opportunity to expand a bit in writing - as requested by you - on the subject to be published. Actually I did some homework on the how to present it best, and I hope you'll bear with me for the time it will take you to be persuaded that what I'm offering is not just a tuna sandwich but rather a gourmet's délice.
What is it that I am peddling around?
Technically speaking - it is a book, 80 000 words, 60 drawings, sprinkled with mathematical quiz "breaks" and funny "breaks"; ready edited under Word, drawings digitised.
Contents speaking - I call it a "memography". Why? Story of a lifetime in memo(randum)s. The story of a person like many others, not more famous but surely not less real, that thousands of others mainly technical and managerial, can identify themselves with: the enthusiasm of starting and building a job and a relationship with an organisation, the adventure of living with it through stormy ups and downs and internal fights, and then the falling out of grace while the company is falling into decadence. With the quoted memos showing (may I say so myself?) a vigorous yet unique approach to getting your own way in the organisation and pushing progress forward while at the same time cutting the very branch you are sitting on. To a certain extent, the text may even serve for an University case study in either managerial management styles for MBA studies or in managerial suicidal styles for MD studies. And it is almost not a joke.
Why come to The Indeep?
First, but not foremost, because as a pedigreeless somebody it doesn't matter if you look like Rin Tin Tin - you're still a mongrel; and if your blood isn't the right shade of blue - it's irrelevant to prove you have real ink streaming through, you're just as uninteresting.
Second, and not yet foremost, because a newspaper covers such a wide range of subjects that it may agree to add one more, quite innovative, to this range.
And third, and foremost, because the newspaper is THE tool of freedom of speech, and my dear company tried to stifle my voice by intimidating me with a lawyer's strong worded letter warning me against publicity. If there is no other reason - this should be reason enough.
The fact is that the book is actually not scandalous. Scandalous may have been the fact that the same lawyer went on to rat on me to my new employer, thus trying to tighten some screws on my forehead, but the book is none of the kind. It does, however, show directly and indirectly some of the internal workings of a big company, mentions real persons by real name, and allows the public (including thousands of customers and employees and commercial relations) to have a glimpse behind the shiny front presented publicly. It puts a magnifying glass on the endless manipulations - positive and negative - of facts, truths, equipment sales and customers problems treatment. Having a newspaper backing me allows me to have my voice heard and at the same time, and I'm not ashamed to concede the point, provides me with the relatively powerful protection such a backing provides.
Why is Scitex, the subject of the book, important?
There is no one in the printing world that hasn't heard the name. Even The Indeep, which had, and maybe still has, a Pre-Press installation including remote plotters which is of Scitex make.
Scitex is the biggest supplier of colour image editing equipment in the market. It is known, famous, and linked to all international major books/magazines/catalogues/newspapers publishing groups: The Daily Mirror, The Financial Times, Herald Tribune, Time, Wace group companies, Gutenberghus companies, etc. Competition includes Crosfield, Agfa and Barco. In Israel, where the company originates from, such a book could surely become a best-seller. Especially giving the present dangerous convulsions (throes?) phase the company goes through. And with the right cues it may grow through sales to Scitex customers, competitors and employees, and through general sales to technical personnel and managers - to become a publicly accepted fun book (it is one) for sales to the general public.
Why should it interest you?
I wish I knew. Then it would be simple. But, if my time is not yet up, please let me try and reason it out anyway.
- Because I believe the contents are of the kind to fall in the (wider definition of) public interest classification range. Real life, real pain, real love, real pulling of strings and manipulations of persons and related organisations by a real other organisation. And real betrayal at the peak of a relationship.
- Because you are in the business of making money and you can use the vehicle of this book for making it. Being a nobody at any subject related to marketing, I will refrain from making any major suggestions. But I will dare make some minor ones. Maybe running for several weeks some kind of a marketing campaign by giving with each weekend edition a book by a new author on a new and refreshing (??? I'm paying compliments to myself, I know...) subject to your readers, i.e. encouraging literary creation (...in Turkey newspapers do it by giving away washing powder...); maybe make a competition out of it. Or maybe having a one time co-operation with the English language Israeli newspaper The Jerusalem Post on a similar background. Or running one chapter a time as a weekly supplement. I believe I should better stop here before I do some more damage...
- And because, last and surely not least, one small chapter in the book deals with an event related to The Indeep itself. It was a purchase done by the newspaper in full belief in the promised installation capabilities, and which almost turned to a disaster if it was not for the hard work of yours faithfully (the installation of remote plotters, about 5 years ago; the newspaper's project manager was S.C., now with the Financial Times).
Dear Mr Hompkin, I know it takes some time to respond and I surely don't want to be perceived as pushy, but I am really eager to see this project in the black and white glorious colours. Therefore I am kindly asking for your consideration and for a reasonably fast answer.
Sincerely yours,
PS. If samples of the material proposed or a full manuscript is required, then I will be delighted to oblige.
|
skip
...wouldn't you have answered this letter immediately, even before your tea break? With tears in your eyes? Wouldn't you have taken the first flight and come over to meet the emerging (well, in his late [many]teens) genius? I would. He didn't. He didn't even answer. Well, of course the letter may have fallen out of the plane, lightning may have overturned the mailman's caddy - anything was possible. Therefore, still with a laugh in my heart and a song (Beatles, the guy was British...) on my lips, I wrote to the gentleman again. A bit of a sharper style, but still the embodiment and emspiritment of Mr. Congeniality himself...
|
|
Mr. Bard Hompkin - Books Editor, The Indeep
06 June 1997
Dear Mr. Hompkin,
This is me again, writing you again.
Since you never received my first letter, if to judge from your no-response to it, then you surely don't know who is me. And I hope curiosity will be the driving force behind your turning over of this first page to find my very first letter in its original unblemished virginal form, without even the date being touched-up. I am so self-appreciatively happy with the way I created it the first time, that in my own self-centered mind I am sure it's the best way to get at least a first minimal spark of your attention to mine so loaded with self-importance case.
If you feel you're more or less at the beginning of me starting to drive you nuts by now (you really didn't read my letter the first time?) - please take a worthy risk and read the few following pages. It really may end with you godfathering a masterpiece. With, at the worst end of it, just losing several minutes of your time. And probably also the nomination to the presidency of Mongolia, which I hope doesn't matter too much since I believe you never intended to apply for the job anyway.
Waiting impatiently for the next mailman's delivery,
Yossi Faybish,
Brussels, June 97 A.D.
|
skip
...I thought of the ' A.D. ' as a nice touch. He didn't. Neither think (probably) nor answer (certified). I started losing my temper, the worst PR possible, and my following letter says it all.
|
|
Mr. Bard Hompkin - Books Editor, The Indeep
18 July 1997
Dear Mr. Hompkin,
Expecting the binder containing all my unanswered letters to you to reach the modestly epic proportions of London's telephone directory (Smiths and Browns excluded), I took the irresponsible decision of asking for a mailing loan at this shark (ooops...) bank institution strategically located at the corner of my street. Having mortgaged only my house, they happily accepted and now I have all the money in the world to keep bothering you on a periodical basis until the end of times (or until I get your "get off my back" answer, whatever comes first). Therefore, in true form of an already almost established tradition, I am enclosing here my previously futile experiments in the not yet established scientific chapter of the communication process with your person. And as the another already almost not yet established science of hopeful expectations dictates - I am hopefully expecting an answer.
Please don't take me too seriously, everybody else does and it is boring.
Hoping you enjoyed the few above sentences, and you are speedily nearing the state of getting fed-up with me in a soon to come enthralling moment, I remain
Sincerely yours,
|
skip
...whatever I did - it didn't help. For all I knew, the guy may have been struck by a red double decker bus or really applied for Mongolian presidency (and won...). It kind of became a game by now, some hope still there deep inside, but mostly keeping my promise to myself to keep on writing to the end of the days, whatever that may mean.
|
|
Mr. Bard Hompkin - Books Editor, The Indeep
12 September 1997
Dear Mr. Hompkin,
I believe I know.
The reason you didn't answer me till now is all with the postal services. They are collecting my stamps and dumping my letters. That's a serious offence which I am going to report to the newly established Belgian branch of Interpol - Stamps and Humid Yellow T-shirt offences (SHYT) department.
However, as you probably know by now, I don't easily give up, and my new weapon is of course the Registered Mail. So - with justice on my side, as well as with a nagging wife that keeps on pestering me about "...you and your fame dreams, why don't you grow mushrooms instead...", I Register Mail it this time.
"And if it comes back,
The very next day,
Then I'll understand" © Elvis Presley
Which, of course, will not prevent me from sending it again. Nothing trying equals dying and who is me to decree who's to try and who's to die.
With this incredibly profound statement, making no sense except to a poet working night shifts as a caretaker, I am resting my case for this once.
And until next letter, and as usual attaching here my previous futile attempts, and on my way to a bright new day, (and before I start stuttering),
Kindest regards,
|
skip
...I must have had a nervous breakdown, or fainted for a year, or something. For more than one full year I didn't write my friend Bard. Not that I didn't keep on pestering other lesser Gods, but it seems I played Freudian denial to Mr. Hompkin specifically. But, as Inspector Gadget's perenial enemy keeps shrieking at the end of each episode "...I will returnnnn" (I prefer many n's to many u's, stop asking stupid questions...), so here I am again, "...I returnnnned" (see earlier remark...).
I am not really sure, but I believe this letter was still actually physically undeniably concretely positively mailed out. After all, I still had a lot to lose... ("ha ha ha", that's again the bad guy from Inspector Gadget and unfortunately I didn't find where to fit some more n's).
|
|
Mr. Bard Hompkin - Books Editor, The Indeep
11 November 1998
Dear Bard,
After so many letters, with us both one year older, I believe it is about time to get on a first name basis - so I will start calling you Bard and you will probably start calling me names. That's alright, as long as your door is still closed on triple lock and I keep banging my head against the golden plate with your initials, who cares? - you don't and I do as well.
Do you have the feeling that I start talking nonsense? That's two of us, and as long as I talk to myself it doesn't matter much anyway.
Or better I stop now, on the one to billion chance that this will be THE letter you ARE going to open and you ARE going to read and you ARE going to answer, and in that case BEFORE I burn whatever is left of the never-existed-anyway bridge I better start putting some sense in these lines.
Supposing you never got any of my other letters (statistically it is possible), or at least you never read any of them (statistically it is sure), I attach them here as usual. When I have enough of them I will probably write a book composed just of my futile efforts to get my book published, which of course sounds like blackmail, which of course it is not. It will just allow me to recuperate some of the dignity lost, and some of the money spent, not to mention all this talent wasted in writing the stuff. Some editor, somewhere, may appreciate it. The only appreciation I would of course appreciate (three in a row) to get from you is an appreciation (four...) of my work. Minimum decency demands that I get either a "go to hell..." attached to a "because..." or a "wonderful..." attached to a "xxx pounds sterling...". Or anything in between. So I still wait, and apologize for a bit of impatient roughness in my tone (just a laryngitis of course...), and wish you a Merry Christmas (it's never too early...),
Joseph Faybish
Brussels
PS "Since it didn't come back,
PS The very next day,
PS Then I don't understand" © Joseph Faybish
|
skip
...persistent, ain't I? I have, however, a strong hunch that this is probably the first letter that was not anymore actually physically undeniably concretely positively mailed out. I got fed-up wasting all this money on paper, and envelopes, and stamps, and licking all these things to get them to stick to each other (with terrifying tales of African mushrooms that may grow on your tongue if you do it too many times, brrrrr...). On the other hand, Bard Homkin developed for me into a source of inspiration which I couln't afford to lose. So I decided on a compromise - keep writing but not necessarily sending. At least not every time.
|
|
Mr. Bard Hompkin - Books Editor, The Indeep
10 January 1999
Dearest Bard,
Even though I didn't get any Christmas present, I am still happy since I didn't expect any. It is actually a wonderful feeling to know that somebody will go to these lengths to fulfil your wildest expectations - you expect nothing and then you really get it (nothing, I mean), wow - I couldn't sleep for the full nine and a half days since.
Now that I caught my breath again (it left me with a small mental deficiency but please disregard it unless if I ask you to regard it) I am back in business. Which business is it - only God knows, but I am in it.
Bard, let me ask you a question: I am the Prime Minister of Guadamaloup and you are a fiery newspaperman working for The Indeep and you write me a letter asking me for a rendez-vous which of course I do not answer (I am The Prime Minister, come on, you really expect me to talk to common - albeit fiery - mortals?). After your seven aborted letters and 24 hours in jail for an infiltration attempt, including some remarks to my genealogical tree, you sharpen your finest most expensive keyboard, and you sit down in your No Smoking private office to cut to pieces this arrogant, smug, snobbish, indecent, balding, who-does-he-think-he-is-even-though-he-moved-his-country-from-the-dark-ages-to-a-wonderful-democracy bastard. You are The Indeep, you are THE PRESS, who dares not answer your summons?
Now lets rotate a bit the game - you are the Book Editor of The Indeep and I am a fiery pen pusher working for Myself and I write you a letter asking you for an opinion which of course you do not answer (you are The Press, come on, I really expect you to talk to common - albeit fiery - pen pushers?). After seven aborted letters and 0 hours in jail since I did not attempt to infiltrate since I cannot allow myself the flight fare, including some remarks to your genealogical tree, I do not sharpen my shabby cheap keyboard, and I do not sit down in my No Smoking open office environment to cut to pieces this arrogant, smug, snobbish, indecent, balding, who-does-he-think-he-is-even-though-he-is-the-successful-books-editor-of-a-newspaper bastard. I am Myself, you are THE PRESS, how do I dare summon you?
Did my message get through to you? Or you are THE PRESS, etc, etc?
I still like you, you are my inspiration, and for safety reasons I wrapped my (paper) masterpiece in smelly moth killing wrappings, positively expecting a (any) reaction from THE PRESS.
Coughingly (this moth killing stuff could kill an ostrich),
Joseph Faybish,
Brussels
|
skip
...just another one.
|
|
Mr. Bard Hompkin - Books Editor, The Indeep
09 August 1999
Even more dearest Bard,
Tomorrow is the biggest darkest day of this century - the complete solar eclipse, the one and only for a lifetime - is upon us. As a country under a never ending eclipse of its own (a cloudy one, that is) Belgium is ready. As a person under a never ending eclipse of my own (your unforgiving shadow, that is) I am ready. As the moon (yourself) hiding the sun (fame and fortune) from a poor mortal (me), are you ready to move a bit, please?
By the way, did you hear the funniest joke ever (promise) about the newspaperman who got married to a queen? No? Well, I promise to tell you the joke in full one single day after you respond to my present letter. You don't think it is worth the effort? Well, you didn't hear the joke...
Yours incrementally aging,
Joseph Faybish,
|
skip
...yet the previous one pales compared to the following one. It looks like I started losing it completely...
|
|
Mr. Bard Pumpkin - Books Editor, The Indeep
06 September 2000
Dear Mr. Pumpkin,
Please let me... what was that?... ah, it is Mr. Thumpkin... arghhh... Hompkin... sorry, about that but so much time passed since our last non encounter that I completely forgot the spooling... here we go again (sorry, since the invention of penicillin, senility catches up with people, no chance to die before it happens to one...)... as I was saying - I completely forgot the SPELLING (ha-ha, got it this time) of your famous name and I truly apologise for it.
So, saying on as I was saying when you saying off'ed me... oh, c'mon, what do you mean you're not as famous as I claim, but you surely are famous, at least with me since I know about you yet nobody knows about me due to your unwavering and undivided inattention. But who counts?
So, saying etc etc - my name is not Stephen King...
Would you mind repeating, louder please, even louder - you know that biting fingernails for longer than a well defined period impairs one's hearing, look what's happened to me... ahmppp... you know about Steve, ie you know I am not him, ie I said it already... well I'll be gone to the dogs... say again?!... doggone is the word?!... well, whatever, but why don't you just shut up for once and let me finish my sentences!...
So my name is not Paul McCartney (you see, I AM original, whatever they say about me), and I don't write songs but I do write stories and I do want to publish them and I do need some support in my quest and I do look up to even anybody that should be looked only down to (rings a bell?) and I do get frustrated that all you think about is money and I do feel like going into an amok run and I do feel like screeeeaaaaamiiing my head off and I do shout - HEEEEEEEEEEetcEEELP!!!! why don't you help me  ..... (these last signs are supposed to symbolise my uncontrolled sobs, the airplane is supposed to symbolise that I am going on vacation, and the last sign is just a typo and I wonder what it symbolises actually...)
I made a promise. It may take me a lifetime to fulfil it but I will. I promised to stop writing when the size of this one way correspondence will reach the proportions of the London telephones directory book, and unless they put it all on the web my mission is clear and I will complete it. Come hell and highwater, come storm and earthquake, come Coca Cola and Pepsi Cola and Cherry Cola and Pensa Cola and any other Word Cola, come (if I keep on 'come'ing I could easily make it up not only to the present London telephones directory but to its red district edition too...)...
So (the fourth one so far) - hi there. One year ago I had a beautiful dream - champagne, and caviar, and dollars, and dolls (strike this one out, I'm married, look what you've done to me...). One year later than one year ago I still have a dream - it is down to fish'n'chips and zlotys and inflatable dolls (strike this one out too, nobody should know...) but it still is a dream and I am willing to compromise. What about you by now, did I persuade you to listen to my plea or are you about to try and place a contract on my head. One way or another you will make me famous and I do hope to enjoy it rather from above ground level, with my eyes squinting firmly into eternity - ANY FAME IS BETTER THAN ANY FRAME... my God - look at me, I am a poet, rhyme and nonsense hand in hand (now for sure a few additional hundreds of cheap contracts are being issued for my pale skin's worth...)
Mr. Bard, Mr. Hompkin, dear friend, with friends like you who needs friends? I will go my way, and you will go yours, and I will stumble in your way, and Windows 2000 will keep on crashing every so and so, and life is really beautiful. With or without fish'n'chips. Even with or without fish. As long as the chips come with mayonnaise. THAT'S LIFE. That's what REAL HEROES STUFF is made of. Or is it what REAL STUFFED HEROES are made of?
Whatever the case,
Eternal peace on you, the sooner the better,
Your devoted devastated groupie,
Yossi
PS no PS (I fooled you didn't I?...)
|