"I sent you love letters. You corrected the spelling mistakes and sent them back."

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Yesterday I got an e-mail from a guy I haven't seen, or heard from, or thought about in a decade! We had a teenage fling for a few weeks when I was 15. In this e-mail he claims that he sent me love letters and that I gave them back after correcting the spelling mistakes.

Hahaha GOD!!! That is such an arrogant asshole thing to do!!! And I had completely forgotten all about it, in fact, I thought he'd made that up, until I finally had some creeping feeling of remembrance this morning.

Thing is, my version of the events is very different. In my version, I had a huge crush on him, and he was the one being arrogant and an asshole breaking my heart. I mean, when I was 15 I was ugly, shy and terrified. Everybody broke my heart!

This is weird! How can our versions of things differ so much? Have you ever discovered that somebody remembers a mutual experience very differently from you?

― Hanna (Hanna), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 10:24 (twenty years ago)

Hanna, you're a meanie!! ;-)

― PinXorchiXoR (Pinkpanther), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 10:26 (twenty years ago)

lets face it, you inadvertantly created an emo band singer. you have blood on your hands, hanna.

― latebloomer (latebloomer), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 10:29 (twenty years ago)

Haha, yes, i FEAR to ask what he's up to these days!

― Hanna (Hanna), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 10:30 (twenty years ago)

your the speaking female voice in all those ABC singles

― lukey (Lukey G), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 10:37 (twenty years ago)

The idea of correcting the spelling mistakes in letters from someone I had a huge crush on does not make any sense to me at all. You are/were indeed, nuts. But it's a great story (and potential lyric).

― Alba (Alba), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 10:43 (twenty years ago)

Hanna, if I would've sent you love letters and you would've corrected the spelling errors, that would've made me like *totally* fall for you... I guess the guy just couldn't appreciate how thoughtful you were.

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 10:44 (twenty years ago)

(I also find it weird that you could have had a huge crush on him then and yet have not thought about him in a decade)

― Alba (Alba), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 10:44 (twenty years ago)

Like Tuomas, at certain times in my life it would probably have made me love you even more too, but I would not be proud of this fact, or expect a girl to feel the same way in the reverse situation. Somehow, the thought of a boy doing it feels much worse.

― Alba (Alba), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 10:46 (twenty years ago)

Yeah I know, it doesn't make sense at all! I think maybe I was trying to compensate for feelings of inferiority by slagging him off in the only area I knew I had an advantage... Or something like that.

xpost
Well, gee, I was 15, I had a HUUUUUUGE OMG I WILL DIE crush on him for like three weeks, then I moved on to other important teenage matters.

― Hanna (Hanna), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 10:47 (twenty years ago)

Somebody really needs to write a song about this.

― Madchen (Madchen), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 10:49 (twenty years ago)

it sounds like something some poor crushed writer would say at the end of a film, explaining to his first love why he could never quite write since. said in a soft whimper.

― cºzen (Cozen), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 10:49 (twenty years ago)

Yes, my first thought when I saw the subject line was Woody Allen Thread.

― Madchen (Madchen), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 10:50 (twenty years ago)

Kära Hanna,

Jag älskar dig. Jag älskar dig mer än sjön älskar fiskerna. Jag älskar dig mer än hamstern älskar sin saltsten. Om jag ska kyssa dig, vill du inte smälla mig?

Now correct my mistakes, please... ;-)

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 10:52 (twenty years ago)

I think about all the crushes of my life on a fairly regular basis. I am possibly mentally ill, though.

― Alba (Alba), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 10:53 (twenty years ago)

Haha, Tuomas, that is an amazing love letter! "Jag älskar dig mer än hamstern älskar sin saltsten", brilliant! You need to use it on someone! But I don't understand the last sentence, "If I'm going to kiss you, won't you slap me"?

(And it's "fiskarna")

― Hanna (Hanna), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 10:56 (twenty years ago)

"if I'm going to kiss you, won't you slap me" - isabella rosselini

― cºzen (Cozen), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 10:57 (twenty years ago)

In your Dreams.

― Alba (Alba), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 10:59 (twenty years ago)

This thread is beautiful.

― Penelope_111 (Penelope_111), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 10:59 (twenty years ago)

Somebody really needs to write a song about this.

see sloan's 'underwhelmed' for something similar. actually, the first thing i thought when i read the original post was that she was acutally chris murphy. swoon.

― colette (a2lette), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 11:02 (twenty years ago)

I barely ever think about any of them. Mine, that is. I think about yours loads, N.

― Sick Mouthy (Nick Southall), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 11:03 (twenty years ago)

In this e-mail he claims that he sent me love letters and that I gave them back after correcting the spelling mistakes.

This is clearly a case of embedded memory syndrome. Serge Gainsbourg's song 'En Relisant Ta Lettre' describes exactly this situation. Well, actually, it's even worse, because Gainsbourg goes through the letter correctly all the spelling and grammar mistakes, and we slowly realise it's a suicide note.

― Momus (Momus), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 11:07 (twenty years ago)

~~correctly~~ correcting

(Commits suicide.)

― Momus (Momus), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 11:08 (twenty years ago)

That Serge, he is a one.

Does Fiskarn mean fisherman? I think I know somebody whose nickname is Fiskarn (although I've never seen it written down, so I can't be sure).

― Madchen (Madchen), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 11:10 (twenty years ago)

My dad's Wife Number Two was a complete cow, and had a spinster aunt at a Wisconsin college teaching English. As a child, she wrote to this woman faithfully and the responses from her aunt always included red-penned corrections on the initial letter. This can't have been nice for WNT. In the midst of my legal problems with my dad she sent me a snotty letter about a claim on my dad's health insurance (I was invited to be a guinea pig for a post-cancer study and the clinic had billed my dad's insurer) which contained countless spelling and grammatical errors in its rush to abuse me for my transgression. So out came a red Rotring pen...

I know exactly why Hanna would correct the boy's love-letter spelling BTW. It's a way of correcting a power balance in a relationship when the other person perhaps believes themselves to be more worldly than you - or conveys that confident attitude - and you're trying to prove you're not intimidated by that.

(xpost: funny who should turn up when I'm talking about this, and with an egregious spelling error to boot).

― suzy (suzy), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 11:11 (twenty years ago)

I corrected spellings in a couple of letters from someone not because I thought he was more wordly than me but because I thought he was a bit thick and I didn't want the letters to be found after my death and for anyone to think that I'd been courted by a gobshite.

― Penelope_111 (Penelope_111), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 11:16 (twenty years ago)

Madchen>>> I know a Fiskarn! (Or "feskarn" rather.) Maybe it's the same person? He is blonde and lives in Stockholm.

Momus>>> Yes, possibly! But I strongly doubt that this person would have heard Serge Gainsbourg. A more likely situation would be that I had read that story or heard that song and subconsciously loved its dramatic qualities and copied it.

Suzy>>> I believe you are very much OTM. Thank you for phrasing that better than I could.

― Hanna (Hanna), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 11:19 (twenty years ago)

Correcting someone's spelling mistakes doesn't really restore the power balance though - it just marks you out as a menko.

― Alba (Alba), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 11:19 (twenty years ago)

(I accept that to a 15-year-old this might not seem the case)

― Alba (Alba), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 11:19 (twenty years ago)

I bet it's more common than you think.

― Penelope_111 (Penelope_111), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 11:20 (twenty years ago)

I missed this - ha ha!

― Alba (Alba), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 11:20 (twenty years ago)

Gainsbourg stole the meme himself, from Bel Kaufmann's "Up the Down Staircase" (I want to say 1963, but I don't have a copy of it), in which too-hip teacher drives schoolgirl crush to attempted suicide through grammar correction.

― Colin Meeder (Mert), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 11:21 (twenty years ago)

I really must try this.

― Alba (Alba), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 11:24 (twenty years ago)

"Don't stand, so close to me"

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 11:26 (twenty years ago)

Colin, the Gainsbourg song is from 1961.

It's a way of correcting a power balance in a relationship when the other person perhaps believes themselves to be more worldly than you - or conveys that confident attitude - and you're trying to prove you're not intimidated by that.

Well, since you waved this question towards me, Suzy, I'd like to wave you towards my LJ entry today, which is about the limitations of the kind of identity politics I see lurking behind your position on this. Stigma on steroids.

― Momus (Momus), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 11:27 (twenty years ago)

Does "hamstern" mean "hamsters", and if so, just WHAT are you proposing, young man?

(are we watching the beginning of a full-on ScandoILXor lurve match?)

― Markelby (Mark C), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 11:51 (twenty years ago)

Haha, wouldn't you like to know!

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 11:58 (twenty years ago)

OK, and I just doublechecked, the Bel Kaufman book (which became a hit play, a hit movie, and maybe the single most produced High School Thespian Society work in the US) is from 1964. The teacher who does the grammatical correction/driving to suicide is a frustrated author who dreams of the Left Bank, etc. -- SOMEBody's memory's embedded, all right.

(Unrelated: Momus, look for an e-mail from me in the next couple of minutes.)

― Colin Meeder (Mert), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 11:59 (twenty years ago)

NB what Nick has posted looks much harsher than it really is!

― suzy (suzy), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 12:00 (twenty years ago)

Hanna, does he have a beard and a record label?

― Madchen (Madchen), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 12:01 (twenty years ago)

Unrelated: Momus, look for an e-mail from me in the next couple of minutes.

Colin, my e mail is actually

momus@t-online.de

not the old Demon address on my login.

― Momus (Momus), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 12:09 (twenty years ago)

Also sometimes 'redistributing the power balance' is all about checking someone's rampant ego/getting them laughed at in mixed company and doesn't actually redistribute JACK.

Mwahaha. Remember that, my little peons...

― suzy (suzy), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 12:11 (twenty years ago)

Right, thanks.

― Colin Meeder (Mert), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 12:11 (twenty years ago)

Madchen, yes, that is the very same Feskarn. He is a very nice fellow. We made up the nickname for him years ago, on a spur, he actually grew the beard after he became the Fisherman. He grew into his nickname.

― Hanna (Hanna), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 12:19 (twenty years ago)

I once replied to a letter from a girl I was daffy about, *close reading* every sentence and telling her what was good about each one. I was possibly mentally ill. It certainly put her off.

Someone once wrote a song (sort of) about me correcting spelling mistakes.

― Jerry the Nipper (Jerrynipper), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 12:24 (twenty years ago)

But I don't understand the last sentence, "If I'm going to kiss you, won't you slap me"?

I was sorta trying to convey opposite, "you won't slap me, will you?". Should I have used "ska" or "skulle" instead of "vill"?

(And it's "fiskarna")

Oh, I knew that. I was my Swedish was better, I did study it for six years back in elementary and high school. Still, I'ts kinda cool having a secret language none of the other folks here understand.

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 12:36 (twenty years ago)

"I wish my Swedish was better."

I wish my typing was better as well.

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 12:37 (twenty years ago)

I knew Jerry wouldn't let me down.

I once sent a girl ("a" girl, sheesh - she was the girl) a short love letter, one word at a time, over the course of about a fortnight. I thought it expressed my devotion, but in retrospect it must have resembled some sort of sinister ransom note. I was certainly mentally ill.

― Alba (Alba), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 12:41 (twenty years ago)

Snälla, slå mig inte om jag kysser dig.
Om jag kysser dig, slå mig inte är du snäll.
Du slår mig väl inte om jag kysser dig?
Om jag kysser dig, så slår du mig väl inte?

― Hanna (Hanna), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 12:43 (twenty years ago)

I never sent love letters. And when someone sent me love letters I acted like a bloody psycho. I think I was too scared to enter that whole honest heart-on-sleeve love letter scene. Way easier to hide behind spelling and arrogance...

― Hanna (Hanna), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 12:45 (twenty years ago)

Skipping 112 messages at this point... Click here if you want to load them all.

whoops missed out a comma!

― sgs (sgs), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:25 (twenty years ago)

The irony!

― Jerry the Nipper (Jerrynipper), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:26 (twenty years ago)

PF: I think it meant that he wasn't interested in the poem as literary expression, much less as something important to me, but only as a linguistic artefact? Fuck knows though, really.

― Archel (Archel), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:27 (twenty years ago)

I wonder why the different colors. That speaks of some effort beyond the single red pen. Were the colors coded in some way?

haha xpost I know!

― sgs (sgs), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:27 (twenty years ago)

Yes it was like noun=yellow, adjective=red, verb=blue etc!

― Archel (Archel), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:28 (twenty years ago)

Jeez!

― sgs (sgs), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:30 (twenty years ago)

Possibly he was trying to point out to you, in a handy visual manner, that you overused certain parts of speech and/or underused others! (This actually strikes me as kind of a good teaching tool) (to use on people you don't make out with).

― nabisco (nabisco), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:30 (twenty years ago)

oh, I didn't mean you, specifically, sgs.

: )

― RJG (RJG), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:31 (twenty years ago)

(So like going by the way people traditionally try to teach writing poetry, he would want your poem to look like America should: more blue, less red.)

― nabisco (nabisco), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:31 (twenty years ago)

Surely, as a peot, you think of peoms as linguistic artefacts?

I don't mean that you can't have both. I can have both. So can you. I think so.

― the bellefox, Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:32 (twenty years ago)

Nabisco's posts are interesting. He understands better than I do what the boyfriend was up to.

He used the phrase 'make out' again!

― the bellefox, Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:32 (twenty years ago)

: /

― RJG (RJG), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:33 (twenty years ago)

Peot? Peoms? For a thread about spelling mistakes, this one has quite lot of tehm.

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:33 (twenty years ago)

"quite a lot of them"

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:33 (twenty years ago)

come, now, thomas.

― RJG (RJG), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:34 (twenty years ago)

(Cezon to thread.)

― the bellefox, Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:34 (twenty years ago)

Fuck!

(x-post)

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:34 (twenty years ago)

Hmm, I shall have to just ask him what he meant, shan't I? I don't think he was attempting a critical analysis, though it may have inadvertently served as one. Perhaps I should have said 'linguistic curiosity'? That's more what it felt like he was treating it as.

― Archel (Archel), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:39 (twenty years ago)

Peot? Peoms? For a thread about spelling mistakes, this one has quite lot of tehm.

I think it was intentional. Which is part of what is strange in this thread, the pinefox complaining about poor spelling from the smitten while drowning us in commas.

I also have first drafts of my handwritten letters, but only because my handwriting is appalling beyond belief, and the first draft is at a speed somewhere between thought and neatness.

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:44 (twenty years ago)

People's boyfriends never cease to amaze me.

― Alba (Alba), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:45 (twenty years ago)

no kidding.

― lauren (laurenp), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:46 (twenty years ago)

Aye.

― RickyT (RickyT), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:48 (twenty years ago)

Perhaps he thought I was setting him an English test.

― Archel (Archel), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:48 (twenty years ago)

I can see many sentences from me, on this thread, without commas.

I don't think that commas, even if quite abundant, necessarily mean that grammar, let alone spelling, is awry.

But, Mr F., I like your phrase about the smitten.

― the bellefox, Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:48 (twenty years ago)

Just boyfriends?

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:49 (twenty years ago)

This thread has been, and, I hope, will continue to be, quite wonderful. I thank you all. However, it has made me quite melancholy to remember that I have neither ever written, nor received, a love letter.

― Adam Faithless (Adam Faithless), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:52 (twenty years ago)

Adam, in the end, the love letters you take are equal to the love letters you make.

― Alba (Alba), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:55 (twenty years ago)

(I cannot be sure of this, as I have not yet reached the end, and have as yet only received one, unwanted, love letter. But I have faith.)

― Alba (Alba), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:56 (twenty years ago)

x-post:

That's not true, though, is it? Surely you of all people know. But perhaps it's the kind of thing that, actually, I know and you, in fact, don't.

(I do understand that you were just making a silly joke etc etc.)

― the bellefox, Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:56 (twenty years ago)

It was silly to post that after you had posted a follow-up, but still -- your follow-up actually confirms that I'm right.

― the bellefox, Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:57 (twenty years ago)

My recall of falling down the stairs was quite great, a sort of superman like experience of flying. My mum said it was just me tumbling into a heap.

The day my uncle accidently let off all the fireworks is also a fond memory, as I remember diving for cover army style, and marvelling at the massive explosion(s). My aunt, cousins etc just recall it as terrifying and anger inducing, and having major smoke inhallation.

I don't know how I've managed to get more cowardly as I've gotten older. It sucks really.

― jel -- (jel), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 17:57 (twenty years ago)

I could have been a pro-wrestler.

― jel -- (jel), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 18:03 (twenty years ago)

I have never received many letters - but then, that is all I deserve perhaps since I don't think I have ever written any, or at least many, to objects of my affection.

I have used talking, in their presence and on the telephone, and also email, to convey things. However, mainly, I have simply written and conveyed them to myself.

I have a shoebox.

― Ally C (Ally C), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 18:48 (twenty years ago)

oh, everyone kept to the love letter line...

― jel -- (jel), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 18:51 (twenty years ago)

Also, just to gratuitously hurt the feelings of Sloan fans: in my trying-to-remember I was pretty convinced the song was by Tripping Daisy.

damn you, nabisco.

― miccio (miccio), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 18:58 (twenty years ago)

This thread is funny!

I have now e-mailed the guy and asked if he still has the corrected love letters. He said they might be stuffed away in some box at his parents' house. He used this:
*smiles*
in the e-mail, and I contemplated sending it back with that horrible e-expression crossed out, but decided he might not find it funny. To be continued...

Tuomas, jag är mycket riktigt upptagen, och du verkar vara en hedervärd gay, haha!, men låt oss för all del fortsätta skriva tvetydiga saker på svenska, det har visst underhållningsvärde...

― Hanna (Hanna), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 20:53 (twenty years ago)

You spelled "underhållningsvärde" wrong.

― nabisco (nabisco), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 21:55 (twenty years ago)

so did you!

― RJG (RJG), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 22:08 (twenty years ago)

(You suck, RJG, I pressed submit and then hoped dearly that no one would catch that. Can I just pretend I didn't want to give her the satisfaction of correcting it?)

― nabisco (nabisco), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 22:27 (twenty years ago)

: D

― RJG (RJG), Tuesday, 9 November 2004 22:50 (twenty years ago)

Tuomas, jag är mycket riktigt upptagen, och du verkar vara en hedervärd gay, haha!, men låt oss för all del fortsätta skriva tvetydiga saker på svenska, det har visst underhållningsvärde...

Javisst! Jag har inte varit tvetydig på svenska tidigare, men jag ska försöka, för underhållnings skull.

Vördsammast,

Din hamstern av kärlek

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Wednesday, 10 November 2004 10:27 (twenty years ago)

whåtever.

― mark grout (mark grout), Wednesday, 10 November 2004 10:29 (twenty years ago)

I've never really written love letters, but back when I was abt 20 (~1990), I was pretty good at writing letters to friends in general (mainly those temporarily living elsewhere or when I was living elsewhere, obv).

The puzzle story above reminds me:
One of these friends was a girl I'd worked with before leaving for national service and then studies. We sent each other letters, and after a while started amusing ourselves and each other with devices making them difficult to read -- continuing the letter on the inside of the envelope etc.

One day she sent me a letter cut up like a puzzle -- this took a *long* time to make legible, since she'd deviously cut the pieces between words. Clearly, retribution was in order. Considering a number of options of how to make my reply impractical, I finally decided on using a toilet roll (no negative symbolism intended, nor perceived by her, it was just a convenient roll of paper). The trick, of course, was to write *along* the paper.

In several lines (so she couldn't roll up the loose end as she read).

Starting from the inside of the roll.

Hee hee hee. I can't remember any of us trumping that one later.

Still, I'ts kinda cool having a secret language none of the other folks here understand.
-- Tuomas (tuomas...)

Känn er inte för säkra...

― OleM (OleM), Wednesday, 10 November 2004 14:02 (twenty years ago)

i dont' think i really wrote love letters much. but when i was returning a book to my high school boyfriend once, i tucked a piece of paper in the book that said 'i love you'. and when i handed the book to him, in math class, the paper fell out, face up, on the floor, where everyone around us saw it, and it seemed very embarrassing. it was the first time i'd told him i loved him, eep.

― JuliaA (j_bdules), Wednesday, 10 November 2004 15:03 (twenty years ago)

i have a trunk back home that's full of letters and other sentimental junk. i wrote and received a lot of letters in high school and university, but not for years. closest these days would probably be christmas cards with personal notes in. nobody has ever corrected spelling, even though i'm sure i needed it many times.

once, i found a sweet little book called 'all the ways i love you.' i was visiting a friend in new york, it must have been around valentines day. i got a fancy pen and crossed out 'love' on every page and wrote 'hate' instead. he claims this is the best 'letter' he's ever received. (it was something of an inside joke-- for my birthday/graduation he had flowers delivered to me at school with a big card that said 'happy birthday. i still hate you. love, mike')

aw.

― colette (a2lette), Wednesday, 10 November 2004 15:27 (twenty years ago)

Hm. I hope that was nice for you.

RJG and Nabisco: I admire your humour, above.

― the bellefox, Thursday, 11 November 2004 15:38 (twenty years ago)

Jag dansar inte bra

― jel -- (jel), Thursday, 11 November 2004 18:31 (twenty years ago)

Stackars Jel! Men det menar ju ingenting hur bra dansar du, om du bara tycker att göra det! Befria dig själv!

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Thursday, 11 November 2004 18:38 (twenty years ago)

*grabs pocket Scandinavian phrase book*

Talar nagon engelska?

― jel -- (jel), Thursday, 11 November 2004 18:41 (twenty years ago)

Javisst!

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Thursday, 11 November 2004 18:44 (twenty years ago)

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