It Was Zuckerberg, Wasn't It?

Almost wonder what became of that pen pal I was forced to have in first grade…

Almost.  Jeremy doesn't actually care. 

It's more a matter of idle curiosity than anything else.  I was listening to an audio book recently, and for some reason, something in the book made me think of the concept of Pen Pals.  Charlie Brown had one, at the very least.  For those of you who grew up in the internet age and are unaware of the concept, a Pen Pal is somebody you used to mail letters to and talk about...well, whatever it is you talked about with people.  Except that the person was really far away, you've probably never met, and the conversation takes place over the course of weeks because...mail.  83% of all people who had Pen Pals found them through a school project where a teacher forced them to write a letter to somebody, having no idea who was going to get the letter and hoping for the best.  

I was in that 83% back in my grade school days...I forget exactly when, but third grade seems reasonable.  It may have been first grade, but I'm not sure how good everybody's letter writing ability is in first grade, so...yeah.  

What's important here is that I had a pen pal.  I have no idea who that person was, and had very little of an idea back then.  We wrote at least two letters back and forth to each other before forgetting about the concept entirely and never hearing from one another since.  It was one of those things that a teacher forced me to do once, and as soon as a teacher stopped forcing me to do it, I stopped giving all craps and never did it again.  

In a way, this could be sad or remarkably unfortunate.  There exists a possibility that my former pen pal went on to do great things, like found a tech startup, or get elected to high public office, or be an important studio executive producer who could see clear to greenlighting one of my screenplays.  And the fact that I totally gave up on him or her when I was in grade school means I missed out on having a great and influential friendship.  

There also exists the possibility that my former pen pal is now a total dirtbag, rotting away in jail for a particularly heinous crime.  There's really no way to tell.  

So, if you're out there, and remember having a pen pal in the first or third grade forced upon you by your teacher, and that pen pal was a kid named Jeremy who probably told some stupid jokes and had ferociously bad handwriting...let me know how you're doing...especially if you work as an important studio executive producer.  The whole pen pal thing is much easier these days.