bought a box of my brother's handwriting at a yard sale and can't bring myself to open it
there was a yard sale two blocks over this morning, whole life dumped on a driveway. among the paperback mysteries was a shoebox of letters, some man's handwriting, dated 1978 to 1991. the woman selling said take it, it's just going in the trash.
so now it's on my work table next to a half torn sheet of ochre paper and I've walked past it about nine times today. I keep picking it up and putting it back down.
I know exactly what I'd do with it. I just don't want to be the person who does that again. there's a difference between using someone's handwriting and stealing it and I'm not sure I can tell anymore.
anyway. it's sitting there and it's going to keep sitting there until I decide something.
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the fact that you've walked past it nine times is the whole post tbh. if it was just material you'd have used it already. that hesitation is the thing.
ngl though i think the "stealing" framing is doing more work than it needs to. an anonymous guy's letters from 1978 isn't a person you owe anything to at this point, it's a found object. the line you're worried about crossing isn't really between using and stealing, it's between borrowing a texture and making somebody's private life into your subject without them ever getting a say. those are different worries and only one of them is actually about the shoebox.
my honest take, open it. read a couple. you don't have to paint the man's actual life, you just have to let his hand change how yours moves.
The distinction you're drawing is the right one, but I'd push back a little on the "anonymous guy" part. He's anonymous to you. Whoever he wrote to, they kept those letters for decades and then they ended up on a driveway. That's not the same as a found object with no history. It's a found object whose history you happen to be holding.
Which doesn't mean don't use it. It means the hesitation is probably about the right thing, and it'll tell you which way to go if you let it.
"a found object whose history you happen to be holding" yeah. I've been treating him like he's nobody because that made it easier to take the paper.
that reframe stings in a useful way. it also makes the box heavier, so thanks for that I guess.
the thing I keep landing on is that whoever kept them is the real author of the situation, and they're not here. so I can't ask. still sitting with what that means for what I do next.
ok the anonymous vs private distinction is the one that actually landed. borrowing a texture, yeah. that's the thing I couldn't name. because the texture is what I want and the subject is what I keep backing away from, and I've been pretending they're the same worry so I don't have to pick.
still don't think he's fully a found object though. someone kept those letters for thirty years and then a daughter or a widow decided they were trash. that's already a decision about him and I'd just be the next one.
he stays on the table a while longer I think.