Category: handwritten

notes, marginalia, scribbles

Like Robert Frost

We have agreed to let the electric company trim some trees.
If they come when you are there

let them
Ensure they leave the wood behind.

Get them to put the small bits
behind the hazel bush

where the rest of the prunings are.
Try and get a card

from the wood cutter,
we have other trees

we’d like him to look at.
Don’t use the pump in the spring

for more than twenty minutes,
and meanwhile remember

to water everything if God
is not doing his fair share.

(A note left for guests at a holiday cottage in Brittany, 2014. Submitted by Nigel Lawrence)

Gatherers

They are likely to have seen a world
much more alive than ours,
where every tree or hill may have had
the Spirit
or been associated with past times
or mythical stories,
where the soul of a man might inhabit
a dog after his death.
They would have known few other people
and few things they called their own.
But then
it’s worth remembering
the Scottish winters spent without houses,
the dangers of travelling
between islands in primitive boats.

Notes taken by a family member during final year of studying Archaeology at Glasgow University, 2012. Submitted by B.T. Joy.

Monica Grove 1B, 1530

Five rooms
All postgrads
But the one guy who was there
wasn’t wearing a shirt
was listening to awful dance music
loudly
and didn’t turn it down.
Not a home.
More like a student flat
per Mackenzie Road, with more
obviously objectionable occupants.

From notes a friend took when he went flat hunting. I found them in an A-Z he gave me. Submitted by Nija Dalal.

25-5-12

Please could you park
in the student car park if
you are in again.

The student car park
is on the opposite side
of the building.

A handwritten note found on the street near to my house in the UK, signed “Traffic Controller”. The title is the date written on the note. Submitted by Steve Clement-Large.

Lined yellow paper

feel like I don’t have to
know everything

feel strong like I could
do anything I want to

feel unrushed

something got after

feel like I know what I’m doing
at this moment

don’t feel alone or crazy

An anonymous pencilled note handwritten on lined yellow paper, found at the Charlottetown Confederation Centre Library in a book on Buddhism in 2008. It was topped off with a green organic banana sticker. Submitted by Steven.

Note to Service Technician


Dishwasher will enter into Test/Calibration mode
at the first power up.
Door must be closed and latched.
Wait till second fill (~6 minutes from power up)
to cancel cycle
by pressing Start/Reset key.
Dishwasher will then be ready
to operate after a pump out.




A note left behind by a dishwasher technician on the 8th March 2012. Submitted by Michael.

You just can’t pitch behind

I had my at ‘em ball going today.
We’ve got to have fun. The catcher and I
were on the same wavelength. That’s why they pay
him x million dollars. Give the guy

some credit; he hit a good pitch. Yes. No.
You saw it … write it. You’re only as good
as your last game. I just wanted to go
as hard as I could as long as I could.

That All-Star voting is a joke. It takes
twenty-four players. I couldn’t have done it
without my teammates. With a couple breaks,
we win that game. I don’t get paid to hit.

Hey, we were due to catch a break or two.
I did my best, and that’s all I can do.

From Futility Closet: ‘In 1990, weary of repetitive interviews, Phillies pitcher Don Carman posted this list of responses on his locker. “You saw the game,” he told reporters. “Take what you need.”’ Submitted by Gabriel Smy.