Margot,

Well, here I am. Stuck once more on the tip of the dry season, wasting time trying t’ get the government inspectors t’ come up here and tell me the land’s no good. I know the land’s no good, Margot, the goddamn workers know it, the HANDS know it, jeez, you’d think all I’d have t’ do is take a picture of these HANDS knuckle deep in the dirt and send it in t’ the feds but no, it ain’t that way. Ain’t never been that way. So here I am. Stuck on the tip of the dry season here on the butte. I wish I wish papa hadn’t left me any land, just written me outta the will, scrawled some kinda warning on his bathroom wall like, ‘Never pay for sandwiches with wooden nickels’ or something sagely abstruse like that. One thing he did say, baby, was never count your chickens, baby. Well you know that when I got here all the chickens were dead. So. Here I am. Dead chickens and pop’s dead farm and waiting for the fed t’ come up and tell me the place ain’t worth the land it’s printed on. One thing pop did say t’ me before he croaked was, ‘Jim, yer only a little less ugly than me. When I go, you’ll be the ugliest guy in the family.’ That’s love, baby.

Hot, on the backporch looking at the bottom of Creation.

xo,
Jim

More from Jim & Margot:
Letter #2 – “Hot, you say!”
Letter #3 – “Well, here we are…”
Letter #4 – “Oh I sea