Dear Becky xxkhydvkxxzzd,

As always, I was flattered to receive yet another electronic missive from you this past weekend. I shall treasure each and every one of your invitations to join "The Ultimate Adult Community." I'm one who strives to be a part of the chosen, and for you to choose me to become a member of your esteemed online club makes me feel proud and accepted. I'm sure those who've joined you and your club brothers and sisters have reveled in (as you so eloquently state in your emails) the "picture trading, chatting, story sharing, and get together[ing] to party, and well, you know."

Still, it pains me to say yet again that I cannot accept your generous offer. I admire your determination and resolve. With each regret I return back to you, you reply with another email asking me to be a part of your "sexy singles internet love shack." I've never felt so wanted in my life. I also find very clever the emails you send me that seem to pretend that you've never corresponded with me before, as if I am on some list randomly generated by a super-computer that churns out thousands and thousands of emails a day. Now, I love science fiction, but I know that most creations of the genre are just that: science fiction. I realize that super-computers like those are but a figment of the imagination of our most inspired and introverted writers and don't exist in the real world that both you and I, Becky xxkhydvkxxzzd, live in.

I can't let this note end without thanking you for the lovely pictures of yourself that you’ve included within each message. I admire the freedom of self you convey in your photographs. It is clear that you are not chained by the stuffy confines of socially accepted norms, and I admire your naturalistic attitude around clothing, or wearing lack thereof. I am also quite taken by your choice of interior decoration. To leave your white walls bare is a bold move, very deconstructionist and minimalistic. The exposed light bulb on the sconce in your hallway is both disarming and challenging. Oh, who am I kidding? I know nothing about the theories of art or design, I just like pretending that I do. I love pretending! I am a child at heart, and I know you know this about me. Why I dare say that you know me very well, as if we were distant cousins or occasional co-workers who sometimes shared the same shifts at the local Wal-Mart.

And that's why it makes it all the more harder to decline your invitation. I know there is a connection between us, Becky xxkhydvkxxzzd, but it must be disconnected. Even though I am shocked and awed by your steady pursuit of me, I cannot join your club. Let me say this one last time in my most sensitive "It's not you, it's me" tone of voice: I cannot join your club. Please don't send another one of your lovely, alluring, and typo-ridden requests: I think it's best that we stop communicating altogether. It'll be hard, but it's the only way for this to end. We feed off one another with our email exchanges, and I think the food has become unhealthy for us, so I feel that we should stop eating each other. Of course I don't mean we must really stop eating each other because if I did it would imply that we've really been eating each other, and that is not the case. We are not cannibals. If we were cannibals I think we'd have far more serious issues to overcome than simply ending our online penpalship.

As I sit here and type this farewell note to you I am finding it hard to cease tapping my fingers over the keyboard, for I realize this will be the last time my fingers type words made for your eyes. (Yes, those are the stains of electronic tears you see on your screen.) A part of me just wants to keep tapping my fingers over the keyboard, just wants me to tap, tap, tap away because I don't want this to end. But another part of me--the part that firmly believes that this should end and that I am not a cannibal--knows that I need to stop tapping now, now, now--oh, there, you see? The part of me that wants to keep tapping on the keyboard interrupted the ending of that last sentence and added a couple of more "nows." Oh, to be pulled in two different directions at once, Becky xxkhydvkxxzzd! Why this? Why now? Why Me? Why this? Why now? Why me? Why this? Why now? Why me? Why--stop that! Okay.

Farewell,
C

This post is dedicated to our new Miss USA, Formerly Miss Massachusetts, Susie Castillo.