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| I’ll think about it… Photo by Kenneth Freeman via Flickr |
Emanuela has been desperately trying to get in touch with me. I get emails from her all the time, or at least, Wayward Cat Publishing does. I haven’t got a clue what she wants because her emails are always blank. Nothing but an attachment that I suppose she wants me to open. Well, I didn’t fall off the turnip truck yesterday, Emanuela, so you can just forget that.
I’m not really all that easy to get in touch with, considering I’m all over the place. Three websites, all the social media, books, etc. We still get calls to our landline phone (It feels weird writing that. Back in the day, it was just the phone.) They all go to the machine, just so you know. This one guy keeps calling and saying, “Hello? Hello? Hello?” Then he hangs up and tries again the next day. I’m not sure I get the perseverance, but I suppose I have to give him some credit.
Other people call and start talking. Some of them can go on for quite some time without requiring a response. Once there’s that opening, they pause, and then say, “Hello? Hello? Hello?” One message I get repeatedly is a tick noise. Just one tick. The problem with that one is that by the time I realize it’s the tick call when I’m deleting messages, it’s often too late and it ends up in my stored messages. Then I have to go into the stored messages and be sure to press delete as soon as I hear the tick. It’s rather bothersome, but there is a certain amount of satisfaction in standing in the kitchen listening to all of these people trying to make contact, and waiting a few weeks to finally delete forty-two messages.
Sometimes I’ll run across a message I didn’t know I had and then I feel bad. Apparently, for instance, my last bone scan wasn’t all it should’ve been cracked up to be and now I have to take more calcium and Vitamin D. I could have started a week or so ago, but now I’m behind on that. Damn bones.
Anyway, the point is that I’d like to tell Emanuela that she should just say something. Anything would be nicer than an attachment. And I wonder if it’s the same attachment over and over again or if she’s sending me new stuff and doesn’t realize that in America, we don’t open unasked-for attachments. I say, America, because I looked Emanuela up by her email address and found out she’s from someplace called Eurocamp. You can see her picture there with all the other people who run the place. Eurocamp is apparently some kind of sports camp, probably for kids, but I’m not sure. And I suppose I won’t ever be sure because Emanuela is as afraid to talk to me as I am to open her attachment.
Sometimes, over the past year or so, I’ve wondered if maybe something more sinister is going on. I mean, think about it… What if Emanuela thinks I’m someone I’m not? Like, her spy contact. Or worse, her crime syndicate contact. What if she’s stuck over there at Eurocamp, undercover, and just really wants to tell the boss that there’s nothing going on there to do with espionage or meth and she wants to come home now. But no one will answer her emails, as they’ve been sent as attachments, as she was instructed to do. But nobody is answering her because she’s sending these encrypted attachment pleas to “contact” at Wayward Cat Publishing instead of “contact” at Forward Fats Flushing or something.
Or worse! What if Emanuela is being held captive at Eurocamp and she’s trying to find someone to help her get away from her captors and she can get to an email program but can only send attachments! And she found, somehow, the Wayward Cat Publishing website and the translator told her that it was a Wayward Kidnappees Helpsite and she’s been trying for over a year now to get help and no one will respond!
It makes you feel sad. In a way.
So, I would like to tell Emanuela that I can’t respond because it’s just not a good idea from where I sit. And she should probably just tell me what she wants, if she can. But then again, I can’t say I’ll respond even then.
Lots of people do actually contact me and tell me what they want and I still don’t answer them. Sometimes it’s because I don’t know what to say. Sometimes it’s because I don’t get the message for a month and then I feel stupid and think it’s best to just leave it alone. Sometimes I plan to respond, but I set it aside for just a moment or two and completely forget about it.
It’s an introverted bubble that’s not easy to pop. If I had any advice to give, it’d be this: state your business and if you don’t hear from me, I’m sorry, but I just don’t want to respond.
If you like, you can try again, but I think after a year or so you should probably give it up.