I recently sent this letter to the Takoma Park Maryland Library. After reading this, please consider tweeting “Free @theodorecarter2” to @takoma.
Dear Takoma Park Maryland Library,
Recently, I tried to tweet at you about my book haul from the Friends of Takoma Park Library book sale and discovered you’ve blocked me. This hurt. I’ve lived here for sixteen years and have nothing but affection for you. That being said, in all long-term relationships, there comes a time when one person writes a lengthy letter that would have been better left unsent. This is mine.
I’ve combed through my tweets to find interactions with you. There were several, all positive, one with a heart emoji. I did admit to accidentally returning your books to the Montgomery County system, but I included a crying emoji to indicate remorse. I’d thought that would be enough. Montgomery County responded with, “It happens :-).” You did not reply. Perhaps you need more.
I began an examination of my other online behaviors. Perhaps I offered up a public persona out of line with your values and principles.
Here are some possible affronts I’ve found in my tweets:
- My open and public affection for other library systems
While you, Takoma Park Maryland Library, offer a convenient and personal community space, a place where I know the faces, if not the names, of the librarians, where I see many of my neighbors browsing the shelves, you simply don’t have the breadth and reach of neighboring library systems.
It is true, I have several times professed my awe at Montgomery County’s interlibrary loan system. I lauded their online class offerings as I made my way through “Drawing for the Absolute Beginner.” I also appreciate D.C. Public Library’s extensive online newspaper database. Also, did you know that D.C.’s Martin Luther King Jr. Library has a slide in it and that they recently showed off a bunch of Da Vinci drawings? Come on! You simply can’t compete with that.
Nonetheless, you, Takoma Park Maryland Library, will forever have a place in my heart for being the spot where my kid checked out every children’s nonfiction animal book, for offering all seven Harry Potter books on CD which we listened to in the car for two years straight, and for offering a space for traditional English dancers during a rainy winter solstice celebration.
I love you for what you are, but you simply can not be all things. I may stray from time to time, but I’ll always make my way home to you.
2) The vaginal melon on the cover of my book Frida Sex Dreams and Other Unnerving Disruptions
The most controversial thing about my online persona is likely my book Frida Sex Dreams and Other Unnerving Disruptions. It has a halved melon on the cover that looks like a vagina. However, if you find this controversial, I would like to direct you to Kahlo’s painting Still Life with a Parrot and Flag. Look at those melons! There’s also Sun and Life. Clearly, these represent female genitalia as well. More importantly, Kahlo painted a number of hard-to-see works showing suicide, organs floating outside the body, force-feeding with a funnel, and the artist giving birth to herself on blood-stained sheets. Is a vagina more out of bounds? If so, please explain that!
Also, having been a bisexual communist crossdressing revolutionary, I hardly think Frida Kahlo would have been shocked by my half-melon book cover. Quit being so stuffy, Takoma Park Maryland Library!
Furthermore, you of all institutions should know better than to judge a book by its cover. Many of the stories in this book are about male discomfort with the kind of female sexuality that threatens the patriarchy. Do you find these ideas threatening? Are you more comfortable maintaining the patriarchal status quo? If so, please publicly say so. I’m longing to have this book banned by someone. This book has the potential to be controversial and offensive if only more people would read it. Maybe ask some library systems in Florida to check it out.
3) My professed love for materials not in your catalog
I have a number of tweets about music and books that aren’t in your catalog, some of which I think are uniquely exemplary.
For instance, several times I have tweeted about how much I like Scarface’s 1994 album “The Diary.” Song for song, I think it’s one of the best rap albums of the 90s. This is what you might call a “hot take.” You don’t own this album, and I challenge you, Takoma Park Maryland Library, to list ten rap albums in your collection that are better. I’ll be waiting. Or, as 50 Cent said in his 2003 album “Get Rich or Die Tryin’” (available through your online Hoopla app) I’ll be “Patiently Waiting.
4) Sexy alien paintings
Riding high on earning a certificate from my “Drawing for the Absolute Beginner” class (I apologize for twisting the knife in your back), I checked out several books from you about watercolor painting and gave that a try.
Not quite ready to try human faces, I painted aliens while working on shadows and practicing control of my paints. Perhaps because I read too much, I started thinking about power, gender, the body, and female portrayals in art. This led to a series of sexy alien paintings I call “Madam President, Extraterrestrial.” In my ham-fisted way, I did my best to point out some of the gender hypocrisy in politics. Also, I experimented with the depiction of sexuality through positioning and poses, even with a subject that is not human. I tweeted some of these images.
Perhaps, Takoma Park Maryland Library, you just saw tweets of amateurish sexy alien watercolors. Perhaps you should look again.
5) A Mistake was made
Maybe it wasn’t anything I did after all. Maybe whoever runs your social media made a slip of the thumb. It’s possible the extensive speculations I’ve made in this letter are unwarranted, but that seems unlikely.
These are all of the things I can think of, Takoma Park Maryland Library. I have certainly done other things in my life that you might find objectionable, but as far as I know, they are not on Twitter. I welcome a response as to what I have done and how we might repair our relationship. Though I’m fortunate to live in a border town that allows me access to several different library systems, you are still my favorite.
Always and forever,
Theodore Carter
