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Wichita, Kansas
June 13
Dear Joe:
Mnghjkl, fhfjgfhjklop phelnoprausynks. No. When I communicate with you,
I see I must avoid those complexities of procedure for which there are
no terms in this language. There is no way of describing to you in
not-language what I had to go through during the first moments of my
birth.
Now I know what difficulties you must have had with your limited
equipment. These not-people are unpredictable and strange. Their doctor
came in and weighed me again the day after my birth. Consternation
reigned when it was discovered I was ten pounds heavier. What
difference could it possibly make? Many doctors then came in to see me.
As they arrived hourly, they found me heavier and heavier. Naturally,
since I am growing. This is part of my instructions. My not-mother
(Gezsltrysk!) then burst into tears. The doctors conferred, threw up
their hands and left.
I learned the following day that the opposite component of my
not-mother, my not-father, had been away riding on some conveyance
during my birth. He was out on ... what did they call it? Oh, yes, a
bender. He did not arrive till three days after I was born.
When I heard them say that he was straightening up to come see me, I
made a special effort and grew marvelously in one afternoon. I was 36
not-world inches tall by evening. My not-father entered while I was
standing by the crib examining a syringe the doctor had left behind.
He stopped in his tracks on entering the room and seemed incapable of
speech.
Dredging into the treasury of knowledge I had come equipped with, I
produced the proper phrase for occasions of this kind in the not-world.
"Poppa," I said.
This was the first use I had made of the so-called vocal cords that
are now part of my extended matrix. The sound I emitted sounded
low-pitched, guttural and penetrating even to myself. It must have
jarred on my not-father's ears, for he turned and ran shouting from the
room.
They apprehended him on the stairs and I heard him babble something
about my being a monster and no child of his. My not-mother appeared at
the doorway and instead of being pleased at the progress of my growth,
she fell down heavily. She made a distinct _thump_ on the floor.
This brought the rest of them on the run, so I climbed out the window
and retreated across a nearby field. A prolonged search was launched,
but I eluded them. What unpredictable beings!
I reported my tremendous progress back to our world, including the
cleverness by which I managed to escape my pursuers. I received a reply
from Blgftury which, on careful analysis, seems to be small praise
indeed. In fact, some of his phrases apparently contain veiled threats.
But you know old Blgftury. He wanted to go on this expedition himself
and it's his nature never to flatter anyone.
From now on I will refer to not-people simply as people, dropping the
qualifying preface except where comparisons must be made between this
alleged world and our own. It is merely an offshoot of our primitive
mythology when this was considered a spirit world, just as these people
refer to our world as never-never land and other anomalies. But we
learned otherwise, while they never have.
New sensations crowd into my consciousness and I am having a hard
time classifying them. Anyway, I shall carry on swiftly now to the
inevitable climax in which I singlehanded will obliterate the terror of
the not-world and return to our world a hero. I cannot understand your
not replying to my letters. I have given you a box number. What could
have happened to your vibrations?