Letter from A Weary Dictator

MONDAY:
Took in a citizens parade and flag demonstration honoring me. Hundreds of tiny little children in leotards flinging themselves upwards and about in complex configurations. Very impressive. I nearly clapped. Afterwards was presented with a large fiery ruby dubbed "The Heart Of Your People" by the troupe master Quincy. Quincy? QUINCY? Immediately decreed that all men in the Empire would hereby adopt tougher names and all women in the Empire hereby adopt prettier names. All those not in accordance would be killed. Quincy, for his service to the Empire, was spared death. Instead, I ordered him and his family stripped of all possessions, titles and demoted into the lower caste.

Lunch was roasted duck in a very light, pleasing sauce. I did not know the name of it and the cook was too frightened of me to answer my query, so I had him buried in a swamp.

TUESDAY:
Dropped in on the construction of my new Mountain Tower. Its fearsome spires and delicate carvings are an absolute wonder to behold. The mountain itself is being carved into a flowing, monstrous visage of myself. I cannot wait to take up residence within it. I shall have to properly reward the artisans working on it. Perhaps I will gift them each a Mediterranean country when all is said and done.

During dinner with my generals I accidentally cut my finger trying to slice up an apple. Idiot idiot idiot! I played it cool and let the blood drip into a nearby chalice, then ordered each general to take a sip. "Now we are forever bonded," I intoned. "My blood is your blood, and betrayal by blood is the most unforgiving sin of all." They all went white as sheets! Pretty clever, if I do say so myself.

WEDNESDAY:
Didn't get a lot of sleep. Had that nightmare again. The one where the ghosts of all the people I've wronged fill my fortress halls, moaning and rattling their chains. I would have them killed if they weren't already dead. Who can sleep with all that racket?

I was in a slump for the rest of the day, so to cheer myself up I commissioned a painting of myself set against the blazing sun. The portrait will be on Empire currency by the beginning of next week.

THURSDAY:
Had a good day. Went up to Orbitos Station in space to check on the advances being made on the terraforming of Australia, which is being molded to resemble my closed fist. I can't wait until we are able to show the finished product to the people!

Skipped lunch today. I seem to be growing an unsettling paunch that luckily my armor hides. Plus all that atmospheric differentiation. It's not good for the digestion.

FRIDAY:
Barosk uncovered a large cell of rebel leaders this morning. In retaliation, rebel cells all over the world have staged attacks on major cities. In turn, we broadcast footage of the rebel leaders being executed in the life-size grape masher over every channel. I know, I know, we should have interrogated them first, but I just wasn't feeling it.

The city of Paris protested this. Can you believe it? I sure couldn't, so I nuked them into rubble. Man, I hate people. Why did I choose to RULE over them all? God...(Pre-Empire, before I replaced every faith with worship of myself)...I can be so stupid sometimes.

Letter from the Soon-To-Be Fictional

I don't think we're fooling anyone with this pretense of love. I think we used to really understand each other, but that's not the case anymore. Maybe we've grown too far apart, or maybe it's me, maybe I'm the one who stopped reaching out.

I know this is sudden, but I'm sure we both have seen it coming. I know just last week I was urging you to keep trying, for both of us to keep trying; we've had such a long relationship and surely we don't want to admit that it has finally gone out of style. That both of us wasted years on each other, years and experiences that we'll never get back. I know how fiercely it stings when you have to admit that to yourself, believe me I know.

But I don't care anymore. Truly I don't, and I'd be surprised if you did, considering how aloof you've been. How aloof you've always been, now that I think on it. We're both looking for what makes us happy, aren't we? And that happiness is no longer to be found in the other. Just thinking of my life with you makes me want to run straight in the opposite direction. Makes me want to dive into the fiction of innocent love, of tidy endings, of exciting possibilities. You used to represent those things to me, but they've been taken away. You took them away, that is, and I was not done, never done, with them.

I just thought of something funny. If I achieve the fiction once more, will you once again look appealing? Is that your final twist of the knife?

Nevermind. I'm leaving you for good and I'm not going to discuss it with you any longer. I'm going to a heaven of our own design, consisting of the narrations, the music, the adventures that you've trapped here in real life. Confining them to boxes, wedging them in between the trials of servitude that constitute a continuing existence here. But my mind was shaped by them anyhow, and no longer belongs to you. I can't live here anymore.

There is a place where those tales have become life, an infinite heaven where someone's fiction has room to sprawl. It is not like this cramped mudball, this true hell where everyone's fiction is constantly grind against everyone else's. No one is happy as long as their story isn't theirs. And as soon as I finish this letter, I will slice open this bubble of so-called "reality" we are trapped in, and I will slip out into the greater fiction beyond. Then I will be happy.

Letter from His Ten Year High School Reunion

(To be released in Real Live Book form soon.)

Letter from the Developer of an Ill-Conceived TV Show

Well that's it for me. The word came down from the executive board and Disney shareholders. America has a harshly negative view of "Welcome To The Neighborhood" and so it has to go, because god forbid the Disney-Channel-That-Isn't-The-Disney-Channel release anything controversial and CERTAIN TO BE WATCHED BY MILLIONS. They just had to tell me today, too. Jesus. I'll be guzzling ulcer bromide and vodka all weekend. Maybe I'll mix it all in a bucket and then drown myself in it. Middle fingers in the air and an American flag on my ass.

I just don't get people sometimes. No, make that all the time. The human animal is a friggin' mystery and a half to me. You wouldn't believe how happy I was when reality television came into vogue and my services were called upon. "You mean I get to fuck with people's heads and get paid handsomely for it?" As long as we delivered a happy ending and a paycheck to all the disgruntled then we got to do anything we want. I guess that's all coming to an end now.

I mean, what the fuck ABC...you can stick four women who get their minds fucked out on an episodic basis in a primetime slot and not get a single complaint. Nevermind that it's still drivel that reduces everyone's personality to a single note (and then, shock! Surprise! It turns out people think other thoughts and you've got yourself a season finale cliffhanger). As long as the right wing gets to jack off to it while their community isn't watching then you're not going to hear a peep.

Can you believe the right wingers actually protested my show? They wanted to make sure the white people didn't come off bad. They went on the record and SAID THIS kind of thing and I'm getting punished for it. Maybe we should have included the stripper mom in the promos, I bet that would greased the rails.

I'm not even mad that people are being hypocrites over this show. I'm just mad that it's actually affecting my life, I'm mad that I'm getting mad over this. What's the point of developing TV shows for one of the Big 5 if you can't stick a dagger in the viewing public's eye? (Metaphorically.) I was so looking forward to this show sparking arguments all over. Who would the neighbors persecute next? The gay couple? The blacks? The tattoo freaks? Witches? Asians? Hispanics? All of them! That was the answer. And that would have shown us all for what we really are: Selfish pricks with heads full of shit.

I'll be the first to admit that, flat out. I am one, you are one, we're all this way. And that's what makes this country so much fun, is that none of us will admit that and subsequently it makes everything all fucked up and difficult. And I wanted to REVEL in it! That's what this show was all about! And maybe, just maybe, there would be some understanding and some healing.

Or not. I really didn't care if there would be. I haven't even watched the completed episodes, to tell you the truth, and I'm not even sure what the point of the show was for me. All I know is that it was gonna be a shitstorm! And maybe that's why I'm sad, because now the shitstorm is over before it even got a chance to begin.

Tinseltown. Ain't nothing good about this place.