Wednesday, April 26, 2006

Brief Appeal To Jonathan Franzen, David Foster Wallace, And Aimee Bender

Hey Guys,

Big fan. Huge. Really.

Just wondering if you might be amenable to halting your writing careers and moving on to something else. Anything else. Gardening is something that people do. Also knitting. Or maybe quality control for an industrial chemical manufacturer. It's totally up to you.

I don't know if you're sports fans, but maybe you've seen someone hit a home run before. And then maybe you've seen the pitcher, who was just doing his best and really trying to do a good job, you've seen him take off his hat in frustration and then hang his head in defeat as the hitter makes that run around the bases and humiliates him. Well, that's what it's like for the rest of us charged with arranging words for a living every time you guys publish something. At least in baseball the pitcher can plunk the next batter. Who do you suggest I plunk?

So listen, you've had your fun. You've expanded and challenged minds. You've entertained and empowered, blah, blah, blah. But some of the rest of us, we have any number of bad habits to service and we certainly can't do it on the salary we're getting from Arby's. So what if you took your talents to one of those other fields I suggested and left writing to us hackier folks. I'd thank you. I know my girlfriend would thank you. And I'm sure that countless self delusional wannabes around the country, nay, the world, would thank you.

So ask yourself - would it really be so hard to stop? Wouldn't you like to grow your own veggies? Make your own hats? Insure the quality of dangerous chemical compounds?

Thanking you in advance,

Kyle

p.s. despite retiring, if any of you wants to do a blurb for my new book, I'm totally on board.

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