Y’all, I gave my local newspaper, The Sun News, a try. In fact, I gave it several tries. It’s really a piece of shit, but it’s my new town’s piece of shit, so I’ve tried to support it. Today it spat in my face for the last time, though, and now we’re through. You see, today my paper decided that the best use of my subscription money would be to print out a nonsensical, stream of elderly consciousness, poorly written letter to the editor that just happens to occupy one third of the editorial page. Without further ado, I give you the last straw:
LEAD LETTER OF THE WEEK
Parents Bestowing Advice to Teens
By Tom Dunn
Dad: You’re older teens now. We sent the kids to bed early, because we want to talk to the both of you.
Mom: You have more freedom now, and Dad and I are concerned about you.
Dad: For years we’ve put a roof over your head, clothes on your back, food on the table and all our love.
Mom: And now we’re worried about what goes on with you and your friends, especially at night.
Dad: We’re going to insist on four rules: no booze, no drugs, no smoking and no sex! We hear rumors about wild parties and they scare us silly.
Mom: Especially no sex. I hear that some kids jump into bed now as if they were going bowling. My God, there’s pregnancy, sex diseases, abortions. This is so important.
Dad: Sex is not a game. It’s beautiful and sacred, because it involves God. Three persons create a baby, a mother, a father, and God.
Mom: We form the baby’s body and God pours a soul into it giving it life. That’s why sex is so sacred.
Daughter: I can see my body, but I can’t see the soul. What’s that all about?
Dad: The soul is really you. It gives life to your body. You are much more your soul than you are your body. I’ll give you a rather crude example: No one can look at a bare rear end without chuckling. Why? Well, what’s happening is that the soul is smiling at the body. We know instinctively that a person is much more than a simple anatomy. We’re all composed of a body and a soul, and the soul is much more important than the body.
Son: It’s hard to imagine the soul. I can see the body, but no one can see a soul.
Mom: The soul is like air, son. You can’t see air, but you breathe it 24/7. If you don’t, bye, bye.
Dad: Or gravity; you can’t see gravity, but it keeps the whole universe spinning in perfect order. I call it God’s shadow; it’s eternal, invisible, omnipotent, perfectly silent and it draws everything toward itself.
Daughter: I see, the soul is like gravity and like air. Fascinating.
Son: I heard that the soul never dies. We all die, so what’s that all about?
Mom: Only our bodies die. At death the soul leaves the body and flies into the arms of God. Dad convinced me that for most people, human misery in a hundred ways atones for our sins a thousand times over. We all have our hell on earth in some way or another.
Dad: Talking about that, when are you two going to get your first jobs? You’ve got to learn what it means to make a buck and see how far that salary goes toward your first apartment or car. Let’s start a little [trouble] of your own pretty soon.
Mom: Dad! You’re pushing them over the side of the nest, they’re just kids.
Son: Dad’s right. I love our home, but I’ve been thinking about being on my own. It would be an old dumpy trailer to begin with, but it would be my dump!
Dad: Good thinking, son, good thinking. We love you both, but the two kids are right on your tail. I know we’re talking down the pike, but it’s good to start planning.
Daughter: Two of my friends want us to rent an apartment together; we’re just thinking about it.
Mom: Hold it, hold it. This is too much. I’m worn out. Meeting adjourned. Thank you everybody. We all have a lot to think about.
The writer lives in Murrells Inlet.
I think you can understand why I’ve had enough. Thanks for listening.
Tags: Elderly Crazies, Get Off My Lawn, Subscription Money Misappropriation, Suckass Myrtle Beach Newspapers, WTF
Myrtlebeachbum 
August 5, 2008 at 12:11 am |
I think someone needs to turn off the PTL Channel, up their dose of Requip, and join the 21st century! Maybe my advise suits the editor as well as the letter writer. The corporate owner of the paper needs a serious come-to-Jesus communication over this crap. MB is a major resort town on the eastern seaboard, yet that’s the kind of extremist non-sense one reads in the weekly newspaper of a 3 stop-light town. Holy hell.
August 5, 2008 at 12:22 am |
Would this make more sense if I were drunk?
Oh, wait, I am drunk. And no, it’s still incoherent.
August 5, 2008 at 2:56 am |
I told an editor bitch that:
1. I will cut him.
2. I will not be renewing my subscription.
3. I see how he has room to print everything except the news.
4. I will shank him.
It was truly a WTF moment.
August 5, 2008 at 3:09 am |
Glad you had a chance to unload on a local editor, but I still think you should expresse your contempt and WTF perspective to the corporate office. That letter was an unfathomable waste of critical print space. I’m curious to see if there’s any backlash printed from other readers!
August 6, 2008 at 5:51 pm |
“No one can look at a bare rear end without chuckling. Why? Well, what’s happening is that the soul is smiling at the body.” –> I think Keats originally wrote that. It’s beautiful.