what is a broken telephone?

Hi, so here in Bulgaria the name for what we (in the UK) used to call racistly Chinese Whispers is broken telephone, or razvalen telephon. It seems like a fairly accurate description of my life, which consists mostly of trying to work out what’s going on, get or give information to my teenage daughters and convince my neighbours in the village that my neck is not cold.

But it’s also a handy visual shortcut for the absolute state of things over the last few years. So much empty discourse, finger pointing, yelling, depressingly corrupt politicians and disappointingly expensive cheese. Bad stories, fake news, shitty lobbying by the fossil fuel lobbyists. I’m not surprised I went into a hole and didn’t want to come out. Maybe you did too.

But the point of this letter is that even though the message might reach you a bit mangled, or changed or misunderstood, maybe it’s time I wrote. I’m trying to write good, bright words, and draw pictures to just make you go, ‘oh yeah. ha. lol.’ Maybe that message won’t get through as I intended, but the point is that it’s fun to see what happens on the way, just like the broken telephone.