TO THE OWNER OF FLOWMAYVIN TRENCHLESS SEWER REPAIR LTD. FROM AJ

October 23, 2012

Dear Sir:

I am writing on a matter that may seem, at first blush, insignificant to your business. What, after all, do the wording, punctuation and format of a note have to do with the maintenance of sewers? Until twenty-four hours ago, I would have said there is no connection at all, which is likely your view too. By the time you have read my letter, though, I believe you will agree the links are strong.

Yesterday I found a note from your company suspended from the bottom of my apartment mailbox. Identical notes awaited the other occupants of the apartment building. As a person on top of your business in both senses, you know precisely what that note said: The trenchless sanitary pipe rehabilitation scheduled on your block today, has been cancelled.

I was puzzled. When you wrote “cancelled,” did you mean cancelled for all time? Or did you mean deferred to a later date? I have seen the word “cancelled” used both ways in recent years. You can understand how the ambiguity might trouble the other building occupants and me. If the cancellation were permanent, we would consider our sewer worries over for the foreseeable future. If, however, the work needed to be rescheduled, when would it be done? And where would that leave us in the interim? We do not have your expertise in trenchless sanitary pipe ­rehabilitation. (Indeed, it takes a certain kind of personality to conduct rehabilitation of any kind, and neither I nor my co-occupants in the building, from what I know of them, are cut out to work in the rehab field.) We rely entirely upon you when it comes to the health of our sewers, and now we do not know what to expect.

I was also taken aback by the presence of the comma after the word “today.” I wondered what that comma could mean. Clearly, the note was in a standard printed format, intended to be sent to different people on different days as circumstances dictated. My first idea was that you had intended to insert the date of the relevant “today” to suit each situation. So, in my case, your vision of the note would have read as follows: The trenchless sanitary pipe rehabilitation scheduled on your block today, October 22, 2012, has been cancelled. But—back to reality—there was no space on the note for a date after the comma. There were only two possibilities. One: You did not have the ability to translate your vision into reality, so I could not trust any efforts you might make to rehabilitate my sanitary pipes, trenchlessly or otherwise. Two: You were sloppy enough to insert a comma where it did not belong. How, then, could I trust you to be careful with my sewers? Both possibilities led to the same conclusion, one that did not bode well for you as a future service provider.

My next letter will be to the president of my condominium association. I wish I did not have to write that letter. But the maintenance of high standards is one hallmark of civilization and each of us has a role, however small, to play.

Sincerely,

Ariadne Jensen