San Francisco, California
August 11, 2000

Dear Readers,

Today’s letter is by X., our anonymous correspondent in Winnipeg. It is the fifth letter in her ongoing series of letters to Mike, her ex-boyfriend, about their thirteen-year-old son. It marks the end of our week of letters about parenthood and childhood, and the beginning of a three-week late-summer hiatus for Open Letters.

On Sunday, the eighth and final issue of volume one of Open Letters, the weekly, will go out to subscribers as a handsomely designed PDF file. A copy can be yours, for free, if you send a blank email to weekly@openletters.net or visitthis page.

As I mentioned yesterday, things will still be happening here atwww.openletters.net over the next few weeks. We’ll be trying out new designs, launching new features, and offering up selections from the archives.

We’ll also be working during these weeks to replenish our supply of open letters. We’ll be soliciting letters from writers who’ve written for the magazine already, and from others we wish would write for us; and we’re hoping as well to continue to receive letters from readers, over the electronic transom. If you’d like to submit an open letter, please do; you can send submissions or queries tosubmissions@openletters.net.

On Tuesday, September 5, we’ll return to our regular schedule: five letters a week, the occasional conversation, and every Sunday, the weekly PDF. See you then. No horseplay near the pool.

Yours truly,

Paul Tough