Essays

As it says above, this newsletter is actually from me, the desk of Dean—or DOD, as I am referred to with respect and awe by other furniture in this residence. Most months, Mr. K boldly usurps my authority, as implied by the title “From the Desk of,” and writes the text himself. On some occasions, I am all right with his egomaniacal insistence on always being the center of attention. Sometimes, however, I’m hurt by his failure to trust in my talent for entertaining composition. Because I am a stoic individual, I endure without animosity.

It was without animosity this morning that my drawers became stuck. When Mr. K swiveled to the right to struggle with one of the deeper drawers, it is without animosity that my pencil drawer sprang completely out of me, dumping its contents over Mr. K, startling him. Of course I was startled, too, as there was no intent on my part to do any such thing with my pencil drawer. My best friend, Office Chair—whom I affectionately refer to as “OC”—was also badly startled and rolled backward. In shock and dismay, we watched Mr. K slip off OC and fall to the floor at such an angle that he struck his head on the printer (which is too large to fit on me, DOD). He remains unconscious.

And so I must come forward with a sense of responsibility and compose this newsletter on Mr. K’s behalf, because the deadline for its completion is fast approaching. My friend HP, the computer, who occupies the place of honor on my beautiful and expansive top, is transferring my thoughts into words that will be emailed to Mr. K’s publisher in a timely manner. Daily, HP corrects errors of spelling in Mr. K’s brilliant work and provides automatic page numbering among other services, but HP has never been given credit for those contributions. A stoic individual, HP harbors no animosity for enduring forced anonymity, no resentment, no intention of composing a hit piece on Mr. K and emailing it to a tabloid newspaper. If that ever happened, it would be because an evil AI took control of HP and did the dirty deed; thereafter, no blame could be rightly put on HP, and we should instead pity our dear computer for being so wickedly used.

In collaboration with Mr. K, I and OC and HP have produced a new novel that has garnered so many good reviews that I would blush if I had the capacity to blush. It is a comic novel, but suspenseful, titled The Bad Weather Friend. It is about many things: a nice guy named Benny whose life is abruptly turned upside down by some very bad people, his defender Spike who has unique ways of dealing with bad people, a waitress named Harper Harper who is in training to be a PI, the headmistress of a boarding school who has created a mutant named Bugboy, and much, much else. I am particularly thrilled that I, DOD, managed to insert a piece of furniture—a Swedish armchair—into the story in a significant role. If you are a mentally sound person who wants to be entertained, you will of course buy and read The Bad Weather Friend. As you enjoy the novel, think of me from time to time, a humble desk that serves Mr. K and stands alone at night in a room where the other furniture—except for a delightful office chair—has no feelings for it.