This is a studio both and production warning. Listening to this podcast may cause
on mitigating obsession and cognitive dissonance. All names have been changed to protect the
innocent, the insane, and everyone else in between. It was the summer
of two thousand and five. At a Kinkos in downtown San Francisco. A
woman named Susan watched worn out pages as they slid through a photocopier, like
they had so many times before, and like they would so many times again.
Just several blocks away, a guy who somewhat resembles me now was turning
twenty four. Hurricane Katrina had devastated the Gulf Coast, and I was devastated.
I'd spent the previous week watching the city I had just moved from the
city I loved, the city full of some of my closest friends, flooded,
looted, destroyed, and ignored. The night before my birthday, my
boyfriend, best friend and I sat in silence in a wine bar, occasionally
choking up in conversation that existed merely to coal the conversation we were avoiding.
At midnight, we chugged Beaujolais in front of a picture window that overlooked the
San Francisco Bay and out across to Oakland and Berkeley, and we wondered where
our friends were. They were okay. We tried to find some bright spot.
We looked for some reason to smile, to laugh. Karen and Ellen
always have a way of finding you when you need them the most. It's
funny looking back now at how much not only my life has changed since that
faithful night, but also how I view those letters, How a simple birthday
gift would change my life completely, how for years it would be about comedy,
and then mystery, which became obsession, and now finally community and perspective
and humanity. The many lives of these letters have all had such distinct and
different impacts on mine, and they've always come at just the right moments.
Like I said, Karen and Ellen always find you just when you need them
the most, and they always bring with them an ironic sense of wisdom and
awareness and maybe just the right amount of cognitive dissonance. This is the Karen
and Ellen Letters. It was the summer of nineteen eighty seven, the Simpsons
made their first TV appearance, the stock market crashed, and perhaps not coincidentally,
Prozac made its American debut. And meanwhile, in Oakland, California,
two teenage girls were moving into their very first apartment July first, nineteen eighty
seven. Dear Mark, When I signed the lease last week, I pointed
out the burned out light bulb in the refrigerator. You said, if I
replaced it myself, I could deduct the cost from my next month's rent,
along with any other small expenses that were your responsibility. So I'm sending you
this list of things I plan will deduct from my August rent less number one
one refrigerator light bulb two dollars two, oven light bulb two dollars. Three,
shed padlock eight dollars four, telephone installation thirty seven dollars five telephone thirty
six dollars six, telephone extension cord nine dollars. Seven, hangers for closets
in bedrooms twelve dollars. Eight extra front door keys, u okade six dollars
nine, fish food ten dollars ten, aljacide five dollars eleven, garden tools
sixteen dollars twelve, ice tray for freezer two dollars thirteen, cleaning stuff forty
six dollars. Karen in two thousand and five, I received a strange and
life changing birthday present, a file folder full of photocopied handwritten letters between two
ten send their landlord. I looked a bit bewildered at the woman who handed
me the present, a woman named Susan who I worked with at, ironically
enough, a law firm. She just smiled and said, trust me,
you need these, and she was right in more ways than one. Little
did I know then that this folder would lead to hours upon hours of hysterical
laughter and then a successful blog, followed by a live performance and an odd
eleven year journey to authenticate those letters. I launched The Karen and Ellen Letters
as a podcast back in twenty seventeen, at which point not much progress had
been made in actually finding out the truth about the letters. But as we
recorded episode after episode, Sarah Stapleton, who plays Karen, became as obsessed
with finding out the truth as I was, and in real time, as
the podcast was airing, we reopened my investing into them and we started finding
answers, and those answers were often quite surprising and almost always a bit challenging.
Throughout the podcast, you'll hear the letters read by actors, and those
letters are read as they're written, Typos, misspellings, poor grammar, and
all of which there is a lot. And as we go along, I
imagine you'll find yourself debating whether or not these could be real. And it
turns out the answer to that question is as complicated as it is surprising.
July third, nineteen eighty seven, Dear Mark, List number two. One
Bay Cable Vision, Cable TV hook up fifty dollars. Two Bay Cable Vision
deposit fifty dollars. I will return this fifty dollars to you when I leave.
Three oven cleaner four dollars, four bath rug thirty dollars, five electric
broom vacuum cleaner forty seven dollars. Karen, July ninth, nineteen eighty seven.
Dear Karen, I have received your lists number one and two of expenses
you plan to deduct from your rent. You may deduct the cost of the
refrigerator and stove lightbulbs, the oven cleaner if the oven was dirty when you
moved in, and the keys and the padlock, provided that you return the
padlock and its keys to me when you leave. I will not pay for
the other expenses because I do not believe that they could normally be considered a
landlord responsibility. I think you have badly misunderstood me when I said you could
make small purchases and deduct them from your rent if I was responsible for them
in the future. Before you buy anything that you plan to deduct from your
rent, I think you should call me first and get my o k Mark.
July thirteenth, nineteen eighty seven. Dear Mark, got your letter.
I'd like to work out a deal with you on my list of expenses.
So I'll pay for the cable TV stuff if you will pay for the phone
stuff, and I will pay for the cleaning stuff if you will pay for
the vacuum cleaner, or we can just split the expenses in halfs I'd like
to get the settled before Ellen arrives next month. Karen PS. A few
days ago, I was sitting on the deck. When I stood up,
I tore my jeans that got caught on a nail in your deck. The
jeans costed forty two dollars. I've saved them so you can see them,
okay. July twenty first, nineteen eighty seven, dear Mark, Hello,
I'm just writing to let you know how much I'm looking forward to moving into
my new home. Karen has described the house to me, and it sounds
well dreamy. I know we will get along famously. As you know,
I'm an artist and i'm majoring an interior design that you see. I'm looking
forward to trying out some of my ideas on my new home. I'm leaving
money matters to Karen. Being an artist, I'm not as practical as she
is. I've been studying art in Washington this summer. One of the things
I've learned here is a new oil transfer process for marbleizing walls and ceiling.
Of course, I'll check with you before doing any work on my walls,
but I know you'll just love it. I have a gauzy picture in my
mind of the house. Now I know that work imagination, and some financial
assistance from you, I can turn my new home into an enchanted place.
Yours, Helen, July sixteenth, nineteen eighty seven. Karen, your expectations
that I'm going to pay for such things as your vacuum cleaner, your telephone,
and now your clothes is totally ridiculous and unrealistic on your part. I'm
sorry to be so blunt but my last letter didn't seem to make my point
clear to you. My last letter was not intended to be an author in
part of the continuing negotiation, like haggling with a rug merch into a Persian
bazaar, but rather a simple statement of what I will and will not pay
for. As far as your genes are concerned, I can only advise you
that you look more carefully in the future where you sit. A deck is
designed to be walked upon, not sat upon. Sincerely, Mark, July
twenty third, nineteen eighty seven. Dear Mark, I didn't understand your letter.
I don't want to buy a rug in a Persian bazaar. I just
want you to pay for the stuff I talked about in my letters to you,
especially the cable TV deposit which is overdue. Karen, PS. Good
news. I fixed my jeens, so now you don't have to pay for
them, okay. July twenty fourth, nineteen eighty seven. Karen, your
lease says that you are to pay all utility bills except for garbage collection and
water. When I told you to call pg any to transfer the gas and
electricity to your house, I did not give you omission to have them send
the bill to me. I expressly told you when you signed the lease that
you were to pay the gas and electric bill. I don't know why you've
had the bills sent to me, but you should call pgn E immediately to
have them service transferred to your name, because I'm going to call them and
have it taken out of my name. As you know, I can't have
the service turned off since there's only one meter for yours and the Caldwell's electricity.
Karen, you've got to stop playing games with me. My patience is
getting pretty stretched. Mark July twenty eighth, nineteen eighty seven. Karen,
when I wrote that I wasn't going to haggle with you like a rug dealer
and a Persian bazzar or bizzar if you prefer, I meant that only as
a simile a figure of speech. I cannot be more blunt than I have
already been. I will only pay for those items I have expressly agreed to
pay for in my letters to you. As to the cable TV deposit,
Karen, you should know that the landlord does not pay a deposit to his
tenant, but rather a tenant pays a deposit to a landlord. Mark Mark,
I'm very concerned about all these rats. Karen, August second, nineteen
eighty seven. Dear Mark, I've asked a lot of my friends and they
tell me you're right about the cable TV deposit. My friends tell me that
landlords don't give deposits to their tenants. So I guess I'll just have to
pay for all the stuff on my lists myself now, since you won't.
There is one new item. When I moved in, I agreed to split
the electric bill in half with the Caldwells in the front house. But there's
two of them, Diane and Marshall, and only one of me until Allen
gets here, So I should pay only one third of the bill until then.
That seems fairer to me. They used more electricity than me and have
two cats. Karen, August fifth, nineteen eighty seven. Karen, I
will not debate the electric bill with you. In the rental agreement you signed,
you agreed to pay half of the property's electric bill. I cannot measure
the amount of electricity used by you versus the amount of electricity used by the
Caldwells and their two cats. Read your rental agreement, sincerely, Mark.
It was the summer of nineteen eighty seven, the Wreath of Franklin became the
first woman inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. The Legend of
Zelda was released for Nintendo. The world population reached five billion, and in
Oakland, California, two teenage girls were still settling in their first apartment August
eighth, nineteen eighty seven. Dear Mark, Well, I guess I've arrived.
The house doesn't seem quite as dreamy as I imagined. I think the
last tenants must have had bad feelings about this house because I can sense bad
spirits here. I've discussed this with my guru, mister Samila Patell. He
is willing to exercise the bad spirits in this house for two hundred and fifty
dollars as he is a good friend of mine. His regular fee is five
hundred dollars, so I've saved you fifty percent. Can I get you're okay
as soon as possible? Mister Patel travels a lot, and we wouldn't want
to miss him. Ellen ps. Karen tells me your decorators in Venice tell
him he must see the bridge of size. It's beautiful, yours, Ellen,
August tenth, nineteen eighty seven. Dear Ellen, I know that you
and Karen have only recently arrived in the Bay Area. I don't know what
the rental market is like where you come from. It is possible that where
you come from, landlords normally pay for exorcisms. However, I can assure
you that the landlords in this area do not pay for exorcisms or any other
means of driving away bad spirits from their property. If you speak to your
friends who've lived in this area for several years, they will confirm what I'm
saying is true. Sincerely, Mark, PS. I do not want you
to marblize the walls, or wallpaper print or paint the walls either. Remember
the rental agreement you sign prohibits any redecorating, altering, or remodeling of the
building by you without my prior written consent. Mark, August fourteenth, nineteen
eighty seven. Dear Mark, you requested that I should ask my friends if
you were justified in refusing to pay for exercising the bad spirits from my home,
and I did. Here's how they voted. Three people felt that my
request was unreasonable. Four people felt that my request was reasonable. But you
were within your rights to refuse, including Karen. Two people felt that my
request was reasonable and you should have paid. Two person felt that my request
was reasonable, and you are being completely unreasonable. So it looks like my
friends agree with you. I'm going to ask them again after the harmonic convergence.
I'll let you know if they've changed their mind. Ellen August fifteenth,
nineteen eighty seven. Dear Mark, I'll pay half the electric bill until Ellen
arrived, but I don't really think it's fair. You know, this house
only have one telephone outlet in the kitchen. I'd like another one in my
bedroom, and Ellen will probably also want one in her. The electric store
around the corner positively, a ric says they can sell me a big roll
of telephone wire for five dollars. Will you pay the telephone company for the
installation of two extra telephones in our bedrooms? Karen, August sixteenth, nineteen
eighty seven, dear Mark, got some bad news for you. My guru,
mister Patel has left the US. He's gone to a monastery in Sri
Lanka to meditate. I don't know when he'll be back in California. There's
a civil war going on in Sri Lanka. There have already been attacks on
monasteries in Sri Lanka by heavily armed guerrillas. Guru Patel recommended another crew for
the exercising of the house spirits, a Guru Lahara. Unfortunately, I don't
have a personal relationship with Guru Leharra, so he's going to charge you the
full five hundred dollars. But don't worry, I'm shopping around for a cheaper
guru. Do you know any bargain Gurus Karen thinks this is all nonsense,
so please write to me about this, not her yours, Ellen, August
twenty fifth, nineteen eighty seven, Dear Mark, Guru Leharra has just informed
of the sad news that the monastery near Trincomale, Sri Lanka, has been
attacked by communist guerrillas and gru Batel has probably been killed. Guru Leharrah has
gone back to Sri Lanka to attend to matters and meditate. So temporarily I'm
going to have to put off the exercising of my house spirits. Although I
know you probably want to get this over with almost as much as I do.
Temporarily, I'm going to try to lure the bad spirits from the house
by putting a spirit house in the garden. The spirit house costs two hundred
dollars, plus the cost of food and the gifts to be placed inside.
I'll understand if you don't want to pay for this expense in addition to the
exorcism sometime later, Yours Ellen, you shouldn't blame yourself too much for this.
August thirtieth, nineteen eighty seven, Dear Mark, enclosed as our September
rent less the deduction for the spirit house usual rent five hundred and ninety dollars
minus spirit house two hundred September rent three hundred and fifty dollars. Karen says,
since three hundred and fifty dollars doesn't divide evenly by two, I'm paying
one hundred and ninety dollars and Karen's paying one hundred and seventy dollars. Yours
Ellen, August thirty first, nineteen eighty seven, Dear Mark, there's a
man who looks over my fence with a strange look whenever I'm washing my fish.
Do you know if he is normal? Yours Ellen, September nineteenth,
nineteen eighty seven, Dear Mark, you shouldn't worry about making Allen cry.
She cries all the time. You know. I'm still waiting to get approval
from your decorator to wallpaper my house. Is he back yet from Venice.
It's too hard to wallpaper over all these luvered closet doors, so I think
I'll just glue some nice fake fur to them. What color would you suggest?
Oh? Could I get a check from you for five hundred dollars as
an advance on the fabric and fur and glue. Sincerely, Karen, September
twentieth, nineteen eighty seven. Dear Mark, I've found out that you gave
a VCR to the Caldwells. I'd like a VCR and so at Ellen.
There's a VCR I saw at the Good Guys store in Berkeley that I liked.
It's three hundred and seventy dollars. The blue ones are four hundred and
fifty. I want a blue one. Ellen would like to get her VCR
before the autumnal equinox. Sincerely, Karen, December tenth, nineteen eighty seven.
Dear Mark, it's been a long time since I wrote to you.
The repairman from Taylor Appliance never came even after we made an appointment, and
our oven still smells bad. I think there's a gas leak, but Ellen
says it smells like avocados. I think Ellen's wrong. You know, there's
a very big avocado tree to our front door, and I think Ellen's just
smelling the true. But Ellen says she can smell avocados when she sticks her
head into the oven, so she says it's not a gas leak. What
do you think, yours? Karen, December sixteenth, nineteen eighty seven.
Dear Mark, we called in a repairman from Reliance Appliance to fix our stove.
He's a real genius. He smelled the avocados too. He said that
gas never smells like avocados. So he moved to the oven and he found
a rotten avocado that fell behind the stove. The repairman charged me eighty five
dollars for the service call, which I will deduct from a January rent.
Okay, yours, Karen. Throughout reading the letters, the first of many
debates we had was or Karen and Ellen really this dumb and demanding? Or
are they just fucking with Mark? And while hopefully none of us were quite
this dumb and demanding. At that age, it was hard not to think
about all the crazy things we did the first times we were living on our
own. My roommates and I once tried to give our landlord giants tickets in
lieu of a deposit. We also used to feed the feral raccoons in our
backyard directly from our kitchen. We willingly let raccoons into our house. So
looking back, this is mortifyingly stupid, naive, insane, But at the
same time, at that age, with very little life experience, it seemed
reasonable or fun. So for a brief moment in reading these letters, we
figured that was most likely the case. Karen and Ellen either felt they were
reasonable or were having fun, but then things escalated like a lot. The
Karen and Ellen letters are Found Correspondents, narrated by me Josh Hallmer and voiced
by Sarah Stapleton, Sarah Beth Kitchen, and Jeff Powell. This episode was
made possible by the following Patreon producers. Adrian A. Yellow, Amelia Hancock,
Amy Basel and et L, Benjamin Choppafong, Casey Jensen, Richardson,
Dana Keith, doctor Jill Cooper, Drew Vipond, Halle Reid, Jessica Elihotzik,
Gillian Natale, John O'Leary, Kendall, C, Kimberly k, Lauren
f Linley, tuscoff Manolas Boulakus, Megan cap Seawell, Mike Sherman, Nicole
and Dennis Henry, Sarah King, sc Shannon Foster, Shelley Brewer, Tuesday
Woodworth, Zach Ignatowitz, Warren, Beth McNally, John Comrie, Jordan Taylor,
Carley McNutt, Lana Sarah c and Lydia Fiedler. If you'd like to
support the show, go to Patreon dot com, Slash Studio both and.
This episode featured music by Everything Junk City Rejects, Neon Coast Fifteen, Neon
Ryder, and Lee Rosevier, with featured music by Maria Taylor Hi