Dear Mysterious Entry,

Last week I was filing through all of the numbers in my cell phone address list when I came across an unusual name, one which I do not remember entering data for. Who are you Ms. Katrina Felger? Your sensuous name sounds as if it should evoke in me a tumble of memories. Rrraaeerrrr...But I have not one recollection of the interaction that led to my having your phone number. Perhaps you were that flirty middle aged woman (I don't know anyone my age named Karina), who sat on the bench next to me at the post office, number 53 in line behind my 48 I believe it was. No my mom does not still tuck me in at night! Did you put your name in my abandoned cell phone while I was paying for my overnight package? Shame on you. Sly, but shame on you. Or was it you, the cross dressing gregarious creature that you were at the airport. When I asked you to please watch my things while I go to the newsstand for a magazine, I didn't mean help yourself to the contents of my backpack. I usually give people the benefit of the doubt. But I will have to think twice, or thrice maybe, before I let another sexually confused person keep an eye on my personal belongings.

As I said I was filing through the names last week, looking for someone to go to the movies with, not necessarily a date, just good company. I thought about giving you a call, just to find out who you really were. I dialed and let it ring once, twice...You picked up before the third ring. Karina, you must have had a cold, because you sounded like my Dad when he's got something caught in his throat at the dinner table. I'm sorry I didn't say anything back to you. I guess I really didn't want to talk to you that much in the first place. I was just wanted to see if you'd actually pick up. So anyways, congratulations because as a result this new SIMS card technology your name will always come up, probably for the rest of my life, right next to my old pastor's name, Paul Fowler.

You're sick. You know that?

Ryan Vaughn
Austin, TX

Dear blue jeans and gray sweatshirt,

I love you guys. For the last two weeks you've made life much simpler for me. Whenever I have to go somewhere, I just wear what I've got on, you. Thanks for being there in the bad times and the...well bad times really. Anyway, thanks for being there.

When I wake up in the morning, there you are lying quietly on the bed next to me, just waiting to envelop my arms and legs again in warmth and practicality. I know you deserve to be washed more than once a month, but come on, you're made of cotton and denim, what do you care? The more coffee stains, the better.

If I had known about you earlier in life, I would have stocked my closet with 6 other pairs exactly like you. That would have been nice wouldn't it? The perfect work schedule: Twenty-four on, one hundred forty-four off. But you haven't complained at all, because you're an inanimate object. You're just an unselfish, heartless, brainless, son-of-a...of-a...well it seems you've eluded the engendering process altogether. You're above that sort of thing.

One of these days you're going to be famous blue jeans and sweatshirt because what people don't realize is that everybody has at least one pair of blue jeans and a gray sweatshirt somewhere. And eventually they will acknowledge that these are the only things they've ever really wanted to wear.

Deep down, they feel it every time they open their closets, the urge to put you guys on. But you've been shoved down to the end of the closet, hidden behind the sixties theme party get-up. Again, not that you care or anything. It's just Why?...Why don't we all come to grips with the simple truth? Look at the old foagies walking around the neighborhood. What are they wearing? Exactly.

It's inevitable, and the sooner we all realize what we were made to wear, the sooner we will be able exist harmoniously in our most natural clothed state. I salute you jeans and sweatshirt (I realize that you do not feel honored or anything).

Vainly,

Ryan Vaughn