Letters one would like to have sent Janette Miller

Letters one should never send

We all do it! We have a bad experience with a friend. The friend prevents you having a Pythian Shot - the last word - so the next best thing is to go home and dash of one of those satisfying  missiles where you tell your friend exactly what you think of them and then in a fit of triumph you post it or in many cases don't.

If you do the results can be calamitous for these florid words how ever brilliantly written can never be taken back but worst of all even if not sent, if you wrote them on your computer they can be recovered and used against you if your target person feels the target can gain by it. This happened to Monica Lewinsky, the naive, ill used and really abused girl by her powerful lover, press and the world because virtually everything you delete on a computer can be restored if enough money and time is spent for the recovery to be worthwhile. 

Like Marcel Proust, who was the master of writing this type of letter to his friends, I regret to say I do this too. Proust used to write wonderful letters to his friends who all loved him but in private he was putting them into his book in the way he really saw them. This book A La Recherche du Temps Perdu is really Proust's unsent letters to his friends. Proust's pen is devastating in its accuracy. The most damaging parts of the book were published after Proust's death. Naturally the friends were shocked and there is nothing any of them could do about it.

I do take the precaution of writing my unsent letters on paper that can and is destroyed and I  usually never send them anyway, that way there is no lasting record of my unfortunate outpourings for unlike Proust on the whole I have no wish to leave a bitter legacy. There are one or two exceptions and it all depends on who dies first as to the outcome but if you have crossed me in a particularly vicious manner from which you benefitted you might be in for a surprise after my death. There are only two people on this list so far.

If a draft of my epistle is on my computer it can be read by anyone at any time. You might not like it but it is not too bad.

Sometimes one is forced to do the unthinkable and send the letter. No amount of procrastination can put off the moment after one realises that it must be sent. There is one up here on my blog where a long loved tree of great age was in danger of being cut down for a car park. I had to send it, three pages of plea and my neighbour, bless her saw how much I cared and the tree is still there. Problem is now it is rather big and needs a trim and I can hardly complain can I?

Sadly a couple of years later probably eggd on by her family she cut it down. I was devastated. It looks awful without it and without the shade of the tree sitting out in the sun is unpleasant. I still miss the tree but have made it up wiht my neighbour. Her family still find it difficult to talk to me as my oringanl letter still hurts. They did it and now feel guilty.

As you can probably guess I am in the process of writing such a letter. The first draft even on computer is too strong. My second three days later is much better and will do the trick by making me feel better in a more civilised way. It is final but leaves the way open for a dignified acceptance if we should ever meet again. One does meet unfriended friends again in real life regretfully

In FB one can just unfriend. It is such a dignified way to do it. I cull constantly. I do not allow any sort of proselytizing or major politics on my personal FB page. The FB friends that do this I visit. I tell them that my FB page is for friends and friends do not want to be preached at. This works well. If I get too many Jesus loves you after three you are out.  I still like you but not on my FB page.

It does take a lot to provoke me into doing any of this. If I do it means I am serious but in the meantime I personally let of steam by writing letters on paper that I never send.