Dear 70 Pounds of Kitty Litter I Put in my Trunk This Weekend,

I love you. Yesterday my car wanted to fishtail about a million times, I could tell. The roads 5 inches deep in some places and wheels spinning at stop lights, the drive yesterday was unpleasant. But you, along with my other favorite invention the antilock braking system, made my little car act like a northern native out there. Thanks for weighing down the back and making traction when the other FWDs out there made it clear I needed it.

Hugs & kisses,

B 

Dear Heartland Credit Union,

Your logo says to me, "Come build a Monopoly house on top of a tree where the sun will get it when it consumes the earth in pixels."

No? Not what you were going for?

Hugs & kisses,
B

Dear BFF,

That was the best visit in the history of BFFness. When I left for work yesterday, I was already missing you and your adorable daughter. When I got home last night, my apartment seemed so wide-open and empty without you two there. Five days were way too short, but I'm so glad we got them.

Hugs & kisses,
B

Dear JH,

Thank you so much for giving me an air conditioner on Tuesday. With nothing but 95° highs in the forecast, that little box in my window will surely be what keeps me from dying in my upstairs attic apartment. And although one of the reasons I came to Wisconsin was to get away from summers like these, the kindness of friends like you makes it all worth the move.

Hugs & kisses,
B

Dear Garlic Scapes and Kohlrabi,

How is it that you look so darn cool?

image from applepiepatispate.com

image from livegreentwincities.com

It's so exciting to open my CSA box each weekend and see what's inside!

Hugs & kisses,

B

Dear Landlord,

Thanks -- deeply -- for greeting your pets the way you did when you got home from work today. You may not have realized I could hear every word, but nevertheless, it delighted me. Your high-pitched voice, your endearing nicknames, and your general jubilee worked together to send me into silent paroxysms of laughter upstairs. I try so hard to act normal so you don't think you have a crazy tenant, but then again, maybe I should just relax.

Thanks to your kids, too, for standing outside my window and holding a conversation with your cat consisting entirely of variations on "meow." I don't feel nearly as nuts now for talking to all the animals I see each day.

Hugs & kisses for pets & kids,
B

Dear Apartment,

I still love you.

Hugs & kisses,
B

Dear American Girl Magazine,

When I was seven years old and reading your articles about how to set up a lemonade stand, what to keep in my tree fort, and how best to decorate sidewalks with various shades of chalk, I always had a vague sense you were writing to a different audience. No one in my neighborhood would bother to buy lemonade, and I never had a tree house. The nearest sidewalk was at least a mile away. Did that mean I wasn't an American girl? No, I never questioned my citizenship or cultural status, but I did believe your world was fictional.

Then I moved to Madison. In this place, families ride their bikes together, and children walk home from school in safety, and I passed at least two lemonade stands when I was out for a walk yesterday (a walk on sidewalks, no less). People play frisbee in the park and have tree fortresses in their backyards and jump on pogo sticks in their driveways. Even the streets are crisscrossed like an apple pie crust.

I officially live in the fictitious neighborhood you always assumed I lived in two decades ago, and I'm happy to see children living out the American Girl ideal, but there's something still a bit unsettling in seeing what I had heretofore assumed was fictional suddenly come real.

Does its reality imply that subrural east-coasters bereft of sidewalks, tree houses, and lemonade stands aren't as American as their midwestern counterparts? What does your magazine say today, I wonder. Do you write for all American Girls, or just the ones who live where you do? It's no surprise to me that you're based in Middleton, WI, just six miles or so from Madison. What of the country girls? The suburbanites? The inner-city dwellers? What about the American Girls living abroad with parents who are missionaries, ambassadors, or teachers?

I'm delighted to find myself in a lovely neighborhood today, but living this out has made me wonder what you're up to now as a magazine. Maybe I'll dust off Molly (yes, I'm from the era when the dolls were all from a specific "back then") and pick up the latest copy of American Girl to see whether anything has changed.

Hugs & kisses,
B

So it's 60° today.

Dear Climate,

Please don't die.

Hugs & kisses,
B

Dear Madison,

You know I love you, but seriously. It's March. Enough with the Christmas decorations.

Hugs & kisses,
B

Dear A,

You are one of many friends whose name begins with A, but you are the only one who currently lives near me. Thanks for being good company, for being generous with your car, for feeding my obsession with British television, and for reading my blog so much it seems you're starting to think in open letters, as well.

So, I guess I can also say thanks for giving me the slight feeling I'm slowly taking over the world, one needed stamp at a time.

Hugs & kisses,
B

Dear The Midwest,

Yesterday evening while I was walking west downtown into a brilliant orange sunset whose glowing center hovered just at eye level above the flat horizon and washed over the landscape like an overturned bucket of blinding paint, I had a great idea.

Have you ever considered mountains?

Hugs & kisses,

B

Dear Stranger Who Smiled At Me In the Coffee Shop Today,

Don't deny it. You followed me in here. You spontaneously decided to come to the coffee shop after we passed each other on the sidewalk. I know you weren't originally intending to come here because you only spent 10 minutes in here . . . and didn't order coffee. You just sat down near me, read a page in your book, and then made light conversation when you stood to leave. It was all a pretense.

But don't worry. I'll be back again. And (I'm pretty sure) so will you.

Hugs & kisses,
B

Dear Movers,

I take back every bad thing I ever said about you. God bless you for carrying 126 items -- among them box springs, mattress, giant chair, kitchen table, and approximately a quarter ton of books -- up a flight of stairs and through an apartment with ceilings obviously not made for people as vertically blessed as you.

Hugs & kisses,
B

Dear 2012,

Please don't suck.

Hugs & kisses,
B

Dear Everyone Who Exclaims, "WISCONSIN!?" When I Tell Them Where I'm Moving To,

For your convenience (and consideration), I hereby provide a list of places that are, in fact, farther away than Wisconsin:

Seattle, WA
Portland, OR
Tempe, AZ
Berlin, Germany
London, England
Aberdeen, Scotland
Rio de Janiero, Brazil *
Pearl City, HI
Taiwan
Sydney, Australia *
Anchorage, AK
Banff
San Francisco, CA
Atlanta, GA
Johannesburg, South Africa *
Prince Edward Island
Missoula, MT
Vancouver, BC
Quebec, QC
Denver, CO
Prague, Czech Republic
Iceland
Sea of Tranquility, Moon *


* Indicates places I have not actually considered during the past six years.

Hugs & kisses,
B