An Open Letter to the Man Down the Street Who Feels the Need to Incessantly Blast Loud Music From His Truck

Dear Man Down the Street Who Feels the Need to Incessantly Blast Loud Music From His Truck,

We have never actually met, so I understand that this letter may catch you by surprise. There is, of course, the language barrier, as well as many other reasons we are not close friends, but I felt it was time for some communication between us.

I have noticed that you enjoy communicating with the neighborhood via the unusual method of your truck's sound system. I applaud you for the unique nature of such a form of communication, but I feel I must ask: what exactly are you trying to say?

Many afternoons, after you get home from (I assume) work, you spend several minutes trying out the different horn sounds your truck possesses. At first, I thought the truck was new, and you were trying everything out. I understand the excitement of a new truck with new sounds, and of course you have to enjoy the new sounds while they're still fresh. But it's been several months now and you still do this regularly, Man Down the Street Who Feels the Need to Incessantly Blast Loud Music From His Truck, so it can't be just novelty any more. And your truck is parked, so you can't be warning animals or small children that you're about to run them over. I doubt you would need a siren to do that anyway.

So, I'm at a loss to explain that, Man Down the Street Who Feels the Need to Incessantly Blast Loud Music From His Truck. But if it were only that, I don't think I'd mind so much. After all, we're all allowed a few peccadilloes, and if honking your horn makes you happy, who am I to quibble? It's really the other stuff that irrationally irritates me.

For starters, who told you that the neighborhood was your personal living room? Everyone else listens to music inside their houses. Not you. You use your truck to provide us all with the same Top Ten Thai Pop songs, over and over. I can hear them from inside my house, and I live a half a block away, so I can't even begin to imagine what kind of hearing loss you must be suffering from to tolerate the sound right next to your truck.

Now, I tried not to mind, especially when this was confined only to the afternoons. I tried to see it as music you conveniently provided for me while I watered the garden. Of course, I would have preferred to listen to my iPod while watering, but you had no way of knowing that. And I certainly do know the melodies of a lot more popular Thai songs now.

But the kicker, Man Down the Street Who Feels the Need to Incessantly Blast Loud Music From His Truck, is that you have started to do this at night. No, not Friday night, or Saturday night, until midnight or shortly after. Even that I would attempt to condone. No. You have started, for NO GOOD REASON, because a good reason for this cannot exist, you have started to play your insanely loud truck music at 3, 4, and 5 am, DURING THE WEEK!!! I wake up in my bedroom and put the pillow over my head to shut out the noise, and I hope that whatever ghosts you are trying to scare away leave quickly. But they don't. Usually, you play your music for an hour or more.

So really, I am writing this letter to ask you one question. Why?

WHY???????

Yours, very sincerely,

The Foreign Woman Down The Block From You Who Enjoys Peace and Quiet

(This letter is inspired by, but not plagiarized from http://mcsweeneys.net/links/openletters/. Check theirs out. Very good browsing the internet on a lazy afternoon reading.)