Now Offering Therapeutic Email Massage

I think that the mental health benefits of the internet have not been sufficiently researched and praised by Doctor Oz and Doctor Phil. But mark my words, in a few years you will be reading all about it. The internet will be right up there with yoga, hot stone massage and acupuncture. Specifically the cleansing benefits of email.

When you write an email, like the one I wrote this morning regarding the hot water situation in our condo, repeated plumbing visits and no hot water for long periods of time during the repair, and also mentioned the untimely death of the SECOND barbecue (that's second and last man standing by the way) on the roof leaving us completely barbecue-less in the middle of barbecue season, - ok this was a really long run on sentence so let me abbreviate. When you write an email like the one I wrote this morning, you might suspect - ok, you know without a doubt that you will be lucky if the first line is read.

Once it is and the receiver sees that (a) it is not about anything related to the payment of condo fees and (b) it is a complaint, she will promptly close it and open the next one if she doesn't accidentally delete it. But anyway you feel really good about writing it. It's like throwing up. All that bad food sitting around inside you is not good at all and even though it's not going to be pretty and you'll probably make sure you do it in private if at all possible, (or in this case in an email rather than in a face to face)- the vomit is necessary and relieving.

Anyway, in the future email will be considered as therapeutic as journalling used to be. Or that "letter that will never be sent" which I was NEVER good at because I'd always send it. I mean, after all that thought and work and how awesome it came out and all - I had to!

But in the meantime, just so that you can be slightly more sure that your emails like these are read I suggest that you fool the person into thinking you're writing about something else and then when she totally doesn't expect it, you clobber her with the gripe. For instance, I might have written,

Dear Brenda (make sure you use her first name)

First of all, let me say that you are probably the best manager I have ever had in all my years of condo living. Your promptness and courtesy are above average to say the least. I don't think we tend to appreciate the work that people in your position do, nor to we understand the magnitude of the responsibility associated with this job.

Because I think you deserve more recognition than just this one email from one insignificant condo owner, I'd like to invite you to a event I have organized in your honor. A celebration of you, a big Thank You for being you and helping us live lives of comfort and safety.

So in behalf of all the condo owners, I'd like to invite you to the Celebrate Brenda Party which will be held this Saturday on the roof of the condo where we would be offering you a great barbecued meal but we can't because we don't have any working grills at the moment. In fact we haven't had working grills most of the summer. You completely ignored my email asking when this problem was going to be resolved but you wasted no time in posting a notice to inform the owners that the gas usage was up and we should remember to turn the one remaining grill off when we are finished using it. (remember I mentioned that we are leaving it on because there is a LINE of people waiting to use the ONE grill. Remember?)

So anyway, Bren, we would love to offer you food, but we can't. We can't have any summer parties. We just stand on the roof and stare longingly at the condo across the street where they bought the HUGE state of the art grills - 2 of them and they are both working. We watch with envy as the owners flip burgers and steaks and have parties and sing songs and get drunk. Then we cry. Then we curse you to hell.

So in other words, Brenda we aren't having a party for you. I just wanted to fool you into reading my email. And you were fooled, weren't you? You know why? Because you are not very smart.

And you know what the saddest part of this whole thing is Brenda? We might have actually invited you up on the roof with us, might have offered you a beer or a burger. Might have clapped a little and toasted you when we were on our 6th glass of wine if you had only tried to do your job, if you had only cared. But you don't and so we won't because we hate you.

Sincerely,
Janine (and Dave because he agrees if he knows what's good for him.)