Saturday, June 22, 2024

A Letter From a Stranger


 

    Yesterday I stood at the railing and tossed a bottle out into the open sea.  I had placed a message into the bottle, in hopes another person finds it and that in itself, sets off yet another adventure.

    When I did all this, there were no ocean breezes, no rolling ocean waves, for I was not standing on deck, but simply walking to my mailbox.  The bottle was a simple mailing envelope, and the message wasn’t handwritten and rolled up, but rather typed and folded.

    My intent was to select a random name from the phonebook, however, phonebooks no longer exist, so failing that, I simply picked an address of a long-ago friend.  I knew two things.  The first was that my friend had passed away.  The second was that the house and its house numbers still remained.  That was as close to random as I could get.

    So, I already know the tide will wash the bottle up onto the California shore.  What remains a mystery is the person discovering the message.  The options are many.  They, of course, could be any age, working or retired, fun-loving or serious. 

    My hope is that having a mystery land at their doorstep brings them a sense of adventure.  I think it is extremely unlikely I’ll get a message in return, but who knows?  Out there, anything can happen.

 



 

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