LETTER TO MY CRUSH

Dear Dipsomaniac Cartoonist,

Over the last few days we have come close. Indeed, you are pervading my thoughts, my life, my real existence.

When first we met at that damp, languid, flea infested, intellectual Cafe Kundera, there was a void in my life, a trace of nihilism I held dear.

Then you quenched my thirst. Yes, you said, "Here, let me feed you." I opened wide like a hungry blind bird and inhaled the generous smoke of your joint, held it deep within me, letting it turn into unbridled lust. How could I possibly resist transcendental decadence such as yours?

"The whole idea of lightness permeates our lives in the form of meaningless emptiness. Our existence is kitsch, a beautiful lie, which helps us to defy the reality of death and mortality," you say, citing Milan Kundera, at - where else - but the enigmatic café bearing his name. You always know just what to say, always ready with a “Big Lebowski” quote up your sleeve for any occasion.

And while you cheat on your Dipsomaniac Cartoonist's Wife and I on my Purple Bull Husband, do I feel guilty? Heck no, there is not even a tad of remorse! That's the beauty of it, my friend with the sullen face who hides the funniest jokes! He knows all about you, and has accepted our torrid affair, patiently waiting for it to end like others before. I ask him if he's jealous and he just tuts complacently, leaving me free to trap you in the boudoir of my mind.

Besides, who could accuse us of breaking our wedding vows when you don't even exist! Infact, you don't even have a proper name as you're just a secondary character, a snippet from a novel that jumped out and bit my brain so hard that what was real no longer mattered.

Anyway, my darling figment of Elif Shafak's magical imagination, I just wanted to tell you - a few pages before the end - that my feelings for you are real even though you aren't. I'm so sorry our affair is doomed, but I guess that's one of the reasons I am so absorbed in it while it lasts (yesterday, I even missed my stop on the metro just thinking about you!) .

I could not resist sneak peaking to the end and gather you'll leave your wife though you don't know this yet. And soon after, the novel will end and I'll be available for my next Crush, because passionate relationships like ours can never last longer than the book of the moment.

Who knows? Maybe we'll pick up where we left of another time - we'll always have our bastard of Istanbul to return to. Or maybe I'll come across you again in another novel or another disguised version of you...

Take care dear love,

Thanks for the memories...

Your Dipsomaniac Purple Cow Reader.

The Dipsomaniac Cartoonist is a secondary character in Elif Shafak's Novel "The Bastard of Istanbul". My feelings for him are true and, alas, I don't even know his name...He is a nice release from the other issues focused upon in the book written by Turkish novelist Shafak, who tackles Turkish national identity and the Armenian genocide in her signature style.