Tag: letter

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Dream Journal

Drafting Letter to Old Man

Older man, sitting in an office filled with memorabilia, showing a patch which says "Cult Leader". The man is John Waters (or at least it was, before someone replaced his face with Walt Disney's).
photo credit to Tom Atwood: original photo of John Waters, from the book "Kings and Queens in Their Castles".

Writing a letter to an old man regarding a recent experience. Maybe our trip to Mexico. As I’m editing I’m figuring out what I want and should be saying. There’s an opener which references the controversial incident obliquely — possibly rather too clever — and I try to dance around insulting the other actors involved, the greater context, or really spelling things out. I need to avoid giving the impression of a promise, or an admission of guilt. But I want to seem like the good guy. This is a creative way of cleaning up from overly-complicated events.

This is becoming a bit meta to me, the person who dreamt it and the person who’s writing it. Perhaps it seems that way to you too, dear reader. That may be because the way it’s being written appears to be auto-descriptive. Best I can give my own analysis. Take it with a grain of salt, though.

The old man was kind of a Walt Disney or John Waters type. But his moustache was not important.

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Dream Journal

Investigation through the Portal to Birdworld

A pregnant stuntwoman parachutes from great height over a dense urban landscape, steering with her flightsuit, but her parachute never opens and she lands in a massive shockwave. The body is is never found and the impact site never pinpointed, so I’m sent to investigate. It’s suspected she didn’t crash, but was working with a covert group to use the jump to punch open a portal. I work semi-undercover in an office near the impact zone, one that’s apparently been shockwaved back through time, as it’s helping produce the show M AS*H. In commemoration of this I leave a postcard for my future self, drawing out big abstract cursive “MASH” letters, having great difficulty signing my name.

The portal must have been real — I pass into an alternate dimension where birds were the creatures that evolved into people. I’m able to blend in as long as I wear full-coverage clothing, which conceals my non-feathered skin. I get a tip that I should seek information on the person of interest I’m looking in the lobby of The W hotel. A large, puffy, white, embroidered ‘W’ takes up a full wall behind the desk. Under a disused wooden lectern, I find a mysterious handwritten note.

Later, I’m seated in the last row of a plane, being given an English test. The instructor doesn’t seem to acknowledge that their instructions are vague and contradictory. After several minutes of backtracking, I begin collaborating with other test-takers in front of me to corroborate the test’s poor instructions. It’s so bad that I’m thinking the only way to deal with it is to convince the instructor to invalidate the entire thing.

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Dream Journal

Missed Opportunities, Missed Everything

Someone rediscovers an old secret of mine, that when I was in high school I got a letter of acceptance into Yale but never followed up on it. I lost the letter and chose to forget about it over the years. I’m embarrassed but also just don’t know what to say. I don’t have an explanation for why I left behind the opportunity, it just… slipped away.

Later on I’m at a swap meet near a terraced park. I’m packing up some metal rods embedded in parking lot asphalt into the truckbed, hopefully to sell. Their partially dug already, and it turns out a vendor there already decided they weren’t worth it and gave up. That same vendor has just sold a small black heart-shaped vessel for $302, a vessel I sold to them only a few days ago for $16. I calculate it immediately in the dream as $285, oddly off by one. For a variety of reasons, I’m not actually upset — although the way he told me, it seems what he expected.

Then I’m cleaning up the park after the show. Walking away with my arms full I see I’ve missed some vape tips in the dirt. I’ll get them another time, I think. I go to visit a group of friends in a further-away part of the bay. I pass their apartment and open a heavy door to a tiny bare windowless ground floor apartment, somewhere no human should live of their own free will. I know it must be hella expensive, too. I go next door to see my friends and their place is the same, but twice as wide.

As I’m driving home, I’m dropping off one of the girls at her subway stop. The town is like New Orleans, her stop is named Mystic, and it’s practically right by the swap meet earlier. Just as we get there she begins to try sweet-talking me into driving her across the bay. She’s cute, might’ve worked, but I see pretty clearly how it’s manipulating my attraction. There’s no actual feelings from her.

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Glot

Concerning Removal of YouTube Parody Videos

Background: I sent this letter to Constantin Films, creators of the film “Downfall” (a.k.a. “Der Untergang”) after a string of DMCA takedowns on April 20th, 2010, directed at many popular “Hitler Finds Out…” parodies. The videos were written about in the New York Times and even the director has said that he likes the videos. It’s unclear what made them act now when there are literally thousands of parodies and the meme is firmly established in Internet culture.

I wish to address your company regarding its recent DMCA takedown notices of “Downfall” parody videos on YouTube.

First of all, I want to say that there is a paper-thin legal justification for these acts and you should be ashamed for censoring free expression. These videos clearly come under U.S. copyright’s Fair Use provisions. It does not matter if the original film was made in Germany, or that the content used does indeed belong to you, the fact that they parody the original film means they are 100% protected in the United States. You filed takedowns through the American DMCA system and you’ve abused that system.

Second of all, this is an impossibly bad business decision. The great majority of these videos show the same exact clip of the film, and in no way discourage people from seeing the rest of the film. Quite the opposite — it should be obvious to any marketer that these videos were a vast resource of free advertising that strongly contributed to the interest in the film. Destroying that advertising, and angering legions of people at the same time, is preposterously stupid.

Lastly, and perhaps most important, there are unfortunate symbolic consequences. I must assume — since legal and business motivations are unlikely — that your lamentable decision was based on personal sensibilities. Certainly I might understand how a German company could be sensitive about clips making light of Hitler. However, not everyone shares your apparent feeling that portrayals of Hitler should be sacrosanct in seriousness. There are many who feel that videos like the ones you’ve had removed rob Hitler of some lingering symbolic power, and, further, that returning that power is most certainly an awful idea. I think you would agree that April 20th, Hitler’s birthday, was a very regrettable day for many of these takedowns to occur.

I have referred many YouTube parody posters to a video by EFF chairman Brad Templeton, and informed them that they can rightfully dispute such DMCA requests. I will be asking others not to buy or rent any films made or distributed by your company. I will also likely encourage or help people download “Der Untergang” for free if they ever wish to see it.

I urge you to reconsider your recent actions and, further, to make amends to these legitimate creators. If I were you, I would apologize privately after retracting all claims against parodies. A press release would be more expedient, but would attract more attention than I’m sure you want. Regardless of how you choose to act, please understand this — people are upset with your actions, and their concerns should be addressed.

Thank you for your time and attention,

-Me.

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Glot

About Last Night…

Bikeman,

I have written this letter in the interests of giving you a fair chance. Who knows? You may well have just been having a very bad night, happened to have found a golf club, and were riding around my neighborhood at 4:40 in the morning. In all sincerity—we’ve all had our nights. But hey, when you started screaming when I asked what you were doing, Lord knows I thought the worst. I called the cops. They came looking for you but of course, didn’t find you. Respect enough. Now, coming back to my apartment a half hour later might not have been the best idea even though I’m sure it helped you blow off some steam. Coming again at 7:30 to ring the buzzer was kinda stupid, cause now I have your photo and could make a real good police report if I wanted. On the other hand, that’d just piss you off more, and would probably piss me off too, so instead I’ll do this: TELL ME SOMETHING I WAS WRONG ABOUT. Seriously. Make me feel bad. Cause right now I feel alright, cause I finally got back in some way for the one of you that smashed my car window WHILE I was SLEEPING in it. Dumb, I know (cause hey, if a guy’s sleeping in his car, he probably doesn’t have some great shit to take… and he’ll YELL at you, too). Tell me I’m wrong to feel righted. I ruined your night? It goes around, is what I’m thinking. For real: there is an envelope behind this letter, and a pen. Write it out. I’ll read it.

Peace,

Bluehair.