To the Greenish Fields of Canada

Dear Sir or Madam,
I regrettably must decline your offer to apply for your credit card as I will be indisposed for approximately the next three and a half years. You see, I am in quite the bind, as I owe my cable company over one million dollars, and, in their attempts to collect, I have accidentally murdered at least three cable guys. (I say "at least" because I'm not sure how many cable people were in the cable van that exploded near my house.) As a result, I must flee the country and seek political asylum before law enforcement officials arrive.

You may think that a new credit card would be an integral asset for such a journey, to which I reply, cease your endless product-pushing! I am a human being. I am not a pumpkin, to be toyed with, abused, or mocked. I cry. I bleed. I am not very different from you, sir or madam. You and I, we don't need good interest rates to lead fulfilling lives. We just need to make it to Canada, and I should leave soon, at that.

I respect your position, though, credit card supplier company, and I can understand your confusion at receiving a letter refusing your offer, let alone a letter from an alleged felon with mountains of debt most likely never to be paid back. I write you because I respect you and have sympathy for your position. It's probably not an easy job, sending out letters that most people will never open, paying for so much postage and getting so little return. I want you to know that you are valued, unlike some employees of a certain cable company. Fight the good fight, sir or madam. Don't give up just because it's hard and you never get the recognition you deserve.

When I told some of my friends that I was going to Canada, they suggested that Mexico would be some hundreds of miles closer, but the Mexicans are not my kind of people. I belong with the Canadians and their eight-month winters, their plain-looking high school students, their lack of representation in the United Nations Security Council, and their presumably free cable. Maybe someday we'll meet their under its hazy skies and recount the days of credit card offers and running cross-country from bloated police officers. We'll laugh, and our grandchildren will play together in Canada's relatively clean, infrequently mowed fields.

Until then,
Robert Louis Stevenson