THAT GOOFY LETTER FROM THE 'FIENDS'

     The day after I left Moab for Australia, the very day after I left, almost all of my advertisers received an unsigned letter with the title, "A Letter from Friends of The Zephyr." Its anonymous authors had a very strange way of expressing their deep affection for me. (If you'd like to read the 'Letter,' it's on the web site, in the archives section, in the December 2000/January 2001 issue).

     The letter was, in reality, an ill-conceived, poorly written attempt to misrepresent the opinions and philosophy expressed in this publication, and, by doing so, its unknown authors hoped to seriously damage The Zephyr's advertising base.

     Didn't work. And good grief, these knuckleheads couldn't even spell my name correctly. For future reference, it's "St-I-les, not "Styles."  Anyway, nice try, kids. I'm flattered that you took so much time and effort to be so small-minded.

     Anyway, thanks to the miracle of the internet and email, I was able to write a response to the 'Letter' almost immediately and thanks to Zephyr staffer Sasa Woodruff, who was in Moab to print copies of the reply and mail them, everyone who had received the boneheaded junk mail received my reply within 72 hours.

     Now, all these months later, it still amazes me that some people in this town can be so petty---and by the way, I KNOW WHO YOU ARE---despite your efforts, Moab is still a small town and as they used to say in the Big War, "Loose lips sink ships."

     The truth is, I always appreciate and even enjoy a frank exchange of ideas and have no problem including opinions that are at odds with my own, just as long as you sign the damn letter. But I think it might be worth it to track the history of this publication's opinions on the issue of growth and development and its effects on the well-being of our community. I've been writing about this subject for 12 years now and it is interesting, if nothing else, to go back through the files and follow the changes in Moab as they happened.

     Of course, it's impossible to re-print all those back issues and editorials. But, once again, there is the internet. So we've set up a new web site, not only to include a chronology of this town's recent history as seen through The Zephyr, but to also make it very clear that The Zephyr supports Progress for Moab. Progress means finding a better life and trying to understand Life and all its variables. Progress. So the new web site is:

www.promoab.com   

That's 'pro' for Progress