Last Friday, I met my friend Peter, an aspiring writer studying in the CBC Prime Time Television Program, for a drink; only, the venue suggested happen to be the setting of a Canadian Film Centre party.
I had wanted to better understand his experience thus far in order to decide whether applying for the Cineplex Entertainment Film Program Producers' Lab would be a good idea. However, Peter recommended I also consider the Telus Interactive Art and Entertainment Program, a collaborative and entrepreneurial pseudo-residence that combines the skills of professionally diverse applicants for the purpose of creating compelling new media products.
So, instead of a chat, he facilitated introductions, and I spent part of the evening mingling with staff from this program. That's how I came to realize the next deadline was Friday, December 19th. I initially wrote it off though, a day of research later; at $8,500, it's by far the more expensive of the two programs. I reconsidered, however, after noticing an obscure graphic advertising a contest to win free tuition:
Show us the outer limits of your creativity by re-imagining one of these real-world items as they could be in a world where the virtual and the real are intrinsically connected and you could win your tuition for the CFC TELUS Interactive Art and Entertainment Program.
We’ll take your ideas as videos, audio recordings, web pages, written documents, animations, or any other form.
This is what I submitted - fingers crossed; what do you think?
April 20th, 2008; night falls in Berlin.
Rena, a beautiful Indo-Canadian journalist, sits silently, bathed in the emerging moonlight, near an open hotel room window. A well-worn laptop hibernates close by her hand, which gracefully scripts the tenderly deliberate words: "Happy Anniversary my love;"
These words unlock others; and, in the hour that passes, flow her deepest feelings of affection for him, future dreams of traveling together, and touching reflections about a sacredly treasured moment they've shared.
A renowned international correspondent, her career separates them often; this anniversary love letter is a cherished ritual that, inside, binds her to him. In 9 years, its creation has been witnessed by none, and ultimately read by just one: Julian.
A knock at the door. Rena greets a deliveryman holding flowers. The attached note reads: "Check your email."
Soon, Vista awakens from its slumber, and Outlook asks if it can display the embedded images of a generic animated anniversary ecard.
She sighs, amused: "Ah, Julian." Her partner, yet near polar opposite, is an introverted programmer to whom everything is automatic: the fridge orders their groceries; Remember the Milk makes his Blackberry beep when he is near Blockbuster and has DVDs to return; and, a Facebook application sends her flowers, plus an ecard, on their anniversary, though Julian usually doesn't realize unless their timezones are less then 4, or more then 8, hours apart, in which case, Skype will start a call the moment he turns their home P.C. on.
Rena powers down the machine, and for a moment, stares into her letter. She slowly begins folding it equal to a standard envelop, but suddenly stops, and, within the whitespace remaining, adds a simple wish: "Sweetie; next year, would you write me a love letter?"
.
.
.
April 20th, 2009; day breaks in Singapore.
A knock at the door. Rena, dripping wet, steps gingerly from the shower, conservatively dons a towel, and greets a deliveryman holding flowers.
The attached note reads: "Check your email." Disappointed, she sighs dejectedly: "Oh, Julian."
Windows fires up, and Outlook chimes: "You've got mail!"; but in the message, entitled: "The Organic Love Letter", there is no ecard.
Instead, she finds a touching poem Julian bookmarked using Del.icio.us; a detailed Google Map outlining a backpacking vacation through South America, including embedded annotated day-trip suggestions from Lonely Planet; a Google Calendar of dates listing their most memorable moments together, accompanied by lovingly written reflections about each from his Blogger journal; an R.S.S. feed to Rena's most recent news stories, in which she finds, at the end of each, is buried a thoughtful comment by Julian; a carefully constructed library of love songs streaming from Last.fm; a beautiful photo collage, on Flickr, he'd made of their life together; two humorous apple pie-looking tally charts that illustrate, using slices, how many times he wrote either "I miss you", or "I love you", in their Google Talk chats, emails, and SMS messages, respectively; her 3-day local weather forecast; a choice between two Canadian Living recipes for her homecoming meal next week; and, a link to the YouTube video: "Confession".
Rena, left utterly elated and speechless, suddenly becomes anxious: "Confession?" Closing her eyes, she clicks the link and listens:
Hi Honey! I hope you enjoyed my Organic Love Letter. I'm sorry I didn't write one personally; I tried to, like you do, but realized, in our house, there's only one gifted writer. In fact, I didn't even create this one; it was automatically generated using all the aggregated Web 2.0 content I tagged: "Automatic Flowers"; or, in other words, from the things I do online because I love you. Hopefully Skype will remind me to call this year; but, just in case: Happy 10th Anniversary!"
Overwhelmed by joy, Rena begins to cry, but the phone rings, startling her; she smiles, realizing Singapore is less then 4, or more then 8, timezones from Toronto ...
My short story attempts to explore whether love letters are a quintessentially human Gestalt creation by imagining an intelligent machine that could use metadata to endow an activity report with the same meaning.
Labels: Canadian Film Centre, New Media, Portfolio, Short Stories, Telus Interactive Art and Entertainment Program, Web 2.0