It is the tenth of October twenty twenty-four and this date marks ten years of The Letterist, which if you think about it is a whole decade I’ve spent making a living from spelling dates out in full.
I should begin by pointing out that I’m a perfectionist who likes symmetry and matchy things so the fact that the occasion has three tens in it alone makes me feel fuzzy inside. Ten years, on the tenth day, of the tenth month of year. If it had been ten years on the twenty-seventh of March - I’d likely be less stirred by the occasion, or think to make much of it.
So there is that. It feels kind of mystical and ordained, even though it really was just the day some dude in government signed a document with a big red seal on it that declared my business officially in business.
I’d also like to begin by saying a big fuck you to everyone who doubted that I’d make it to even two or three years, let alone ten. I’m intelligent, multi-talented, multi-lingual, ambitious, hard-working, well-traveled, well-read, well-connected, passionate, persistent, stubborn, attractive, charming, and funny. Of course I was going to make it. (And yes, yes, this is also a note to self).
To be fair, I should then also say a big I love you to the handful of people I’ve called over and over, at the 7, 8, 9, and almost-10-year marks saying I don’t think I can do this anymore!
Those people have wisely and patiently reminded me each time:
You can, you will, and you must.
You just need some rest.
You can’t possibly work for someone else ever again.
You’d shrivel up and die if you went back to nine-to-five or had someone else tell you when you can and cannot take a trip.
What you’ve created is amazing and it has grown and it will only continue to grow and there is nothing else like it and you have to continue giving it to the world.
I love you. All I heard in that was rest, take a trip, continue giving.
That’s great fucking advice.
Sorry if my swearing bothers you, but I received another great piece of advice this morning to write this letter from the heart and as a stream-of-consciousness and there are swear words in my stream. It’s my party and I’ll cry and swear if I want to.
I’ve cried a lot the last few days. Think Diane Keaton in Something’s Gotta Give sitting at her laptop, bawling. (On a side note, whenever I see that scene I think, how can someone in head-to-toe cashmere in their house in the Hamptons in a Nancy Meyers interior…possibly be in tears? It seems implausible.) (On a second side note, I hope I will be writing this letter on the twentieth or thirtieth anniversary of The Letterist from my house in the Hamptons, in cashmere). (It doesn’t precisely have to be The Hamptons or head-to-toe, but there has to be a house near a large body of water and a body largely covered in cashmere).
Ok I’m digressing with jokes because I was about to get vulnerable. I’ve cried a lot. I don’t know what about precisely. The good memories, the bad ones, the fact that I once had zero envelopes and I now have over ten thousand and if like, math works, that means that I’ll soon have a hundred thousand?
The fact that I have never in ten years had to seek out work. That it has always come to me - enthusiastically - and that it has brought with it experiences, adventures, lessons, and some crazy cool friendships - some with people I’ve never even met in person. That I can land almost anywhere in the world and find someone willing to wine, dine, work or play with me...simply because I am The Letterist.
I’ve cried over the beautiful blurriness of all of it. Of friends becoming clients and suppliers becoming friends and family becoming suppliers and fans becoming interns…of not knowing whether I work from home or live in a studio…of becoming less and less sure on whether I sell The Letterist or The Letterist sells me.
I’ve cried over the price of making mistakes. And the pain of needing to make some of them more than once.
I’ve cried because being an artist demands of you to feel everything deeply and because owning a business demands of you to not.
I’ve cried over the fact that what I create is all ephemera and likely to end up in the trash and I’ve also cried thinking about how every single one of those pieces of paper was actually a sweet and thoughtful gesture of kindness and love and how what I actually create is simply a way for people to put their feelings down on paper. In a notebook, on a personalized letter, on a thick embossed invitation to a party. I love you, thank you, you’re welcome, you’re wanted, you’re needed, call me. That’s all these pieces of paper ever really say, isn’t it?
I’ve cried because it seems so simple, and yet it’s often so painfully complicated.
I’ve cried because I love what I do, and because love hurts.
I’ve cried because this damn business has constantly grown which means that I’ve quite consistently endured nothing but growing pains.
I’ve cried because my baby is growing up. Because she has to step into some bigger shoes of investments, logistics, contracts, expenses and employees and because I wish she would remain little and barefoot and lying on the floor with a paintbrush in one hand and a cigarette in the other, just vaguely dreaming and imagining that it will all turn out great.
I’ve cried because it did all turn out great.
Now I’m crying because of how good it just felt to get all this down on paper.
Love on Paper man, it’s dope.
Anja, The Letterist.
