One of my projects as I recover from shoulder surgery and can’t ride has been to go through my two bins of freelance writing files --discard some, make new folders for other, try to locate all the articles and fiction I ever wrote in the 20 years I was freelancing (no idea why I am doing this, but just know if I don’t, it will never get done and the golden words that fell from my pen will be lost forever) —anyway . . .
I had a folder marked “fan mail” into which I put every card or letter where someone wrote to me that he or she liked what I wrote. After reading them once, I put them into the folder. Never looked at them again. Now, 15 years after my last story was published, as I am going through the articles and short stories, I decided to put said fan mail into the folder with whatever story it cited --much to my surprise I discovered that over the two decades, one man had been writing to compliment me on pretty much everything I wrote --nothing inappropriate --just “Saw your article in [any name of magazine] and liked what you wrote.” Sincerely Bob. Now the weird part to me is I actually KNOW this guy —he used to face off against my daughter in court all the time (and lost every time --daughter is a killer prosecutor). However, when he was writing to ME the kid would have been in grade school – FURTHER, to have read as many different articles and stories as he did, he had to be looking for my stuff --I wrote for EQUUS, Practical Horseman, Western Horseman, Horse Illustrate, Equine Image, The Sentinel, the local newspaper, and a few other newspapers in the area.
Anyway, without doing a lot of checking, I think he is no longer in the area --like me he would have passed retirement age a few years ago.
There was never anything inappropriate in his letters --longest one asked me to “inform him” should I have a book published (in my dreams).
Strangest of all is this fellow, to the best of my knowledge had NO CONNECTION to the horse world I live in --his kid was never in saddle club (unusual name so I’d remember it), his wife (he had 3 as I recall) didn’t show --they might have been casual horse owners --but still seems very, very odd to me.
Made me recall how Stephen King’s fictional writer was kidnaped by crazy Cathy Bates who called herself his : “Number One Fan.”
So have I been stalked if I never knew it? If a tree falls in the woods . . .
I think I said thanks and managed to rush him off the phone politely (I work remotely so do everything off my own phone and had interviewed the candidate who worked in that office as an investigator by phone call) so I could finish my food. Like dude you could at least not introduce yourself that way (our county prosecutor from much of what I’ve heard is kinda a jerk - I haven’t had to deal with him often but have heard him speak at a government meeting or two and haven’t much liked what he’s had to say on things. I don’t trust him further than I could throw him but I’m that way with every elected official.)
‘Twas a lil’ weird. I’m just glad I didn’t answer the phone with my mouth full or something equally embarrassing/awkward.
