Dear Merlin
Dear Merlin,
Re: Fake Rocks, Salami Commanders, and Just Enough to Start
I’ve been a card-carrying member of the Unofficial Merlin Mann Internet Stalker Collective (aka. Mann Chaser) for quite some time now. I think I first heard from you during an early episode of MacBreak Weekly, and quickly amassed a collection of URL’s to stalk follow your internet trajectory.
When you had your recent rebirth and published the ‘Better’ manifesto I was right with you. I understood and appreciated where you were heading, and I was more than happy to come for the ride. Dammit, I was even excited about it.
Lets be honest - you’re charismatic, witty, and have the kind of ease about you that I (and many others) would love to carry. It’s fantastically easy for me to subscribe to your varied RSS feeds and Podcasts 1 , and to find value and comfort in them. It’s fantastically easy to be swept up in your enthusiasm for creating. But truthfully, I’m ashamed to say that I seem to spend more time taking in your jokes and wit while ignoring or hiding from the core message.
So here I sit, a few days later, with Clackity in my mind, and the bolognese base for a funky lasagne bubbling away behind me. I’m preparing dinner in advance for some old friends who are coming over tomorrow night. When there’s two kids under 4 in your house, it get’s difficult to do big things.
Our coming guests are old friends - when I moved out of home, I moved in with them. They were a couple then, they are a quartet now. It’s slightly creepy how friends all seem to breed together, and equally as sad when they drift apart as their kids force them into new circles, by virtue of a different year level at school, a different suburb, or something else similarly inane.
This change is coming. I know it, I feel it. I am resigned to it, and slightly resentful of it. At least we have our childless friends who will remain close. There will be no external influence to push and pull us apart. They will remain close despite the suburbs, and our children will grow knowing them always near. I am comforted by this.
They like lasagne also, so everything should be fine.
I’m not sure where this first letter is headed, and I’m well aware of its complete lack of editing. I’m sure it will get better. Not this letter, obviously, but maybe the next one, or the one after that. Eventually it will suck less, or at least I will accept the suckiness, and carry on regardless.
I’d better head off to take care of the bolognese, and get started on the bechamel.
Keep on keeping on, eh Merlin? And know that you bring joy and some inspiration to at least one mid-30’s dad with thinning hair and a fairly low-quality beard.
Cheers,
gizo
