The Bug Letter

The Bug Letter

Do everything without complaining and arguing, so that no one can criticize you.

Philippians 2:14-15

Have you ever written a letter of complaint to a big company? My experience with doing that has been less than satisfactory on the whole. I get the impression that companies have a file full of standard complaint responses, and they reply automatically based on the kind of complaint submitted. In other words, complaint number two generates response number two, and so forth. Basically, trying to get a personalized answer to a complaint is often an exercise in futility.

In the publishing business, there’s no such thing as a book with no mistakes in it. Imperfect publishing folks simply cannot produce perfect books, no matter how diligently we try. And readers love to point out a typo or a misspelled word they find. To their surprise, rather than become defensive about their complaints, we thank them for helping us make our books the best they can be and promise to fix the mistake as soon as possible.

One complaint case I heard about (not in the publishing business, thank goodness!) concerned a man who was tormented by bedbugs in his sleeping car on the train. He wrote an indignant letter about the matter to the general passenger agent of the railroad.

His friends cautioned him that he would probably not receive so much as a reply, but he was so upset that he decided to try it anyway. To his surprise and great satisfaction, in due course he received an apologetic letter from the railroad assuring him that such a thing could never happen again. He smiled to think that his letter had caused such action on the part of the railroad.

His elation was quashed a moment later, however, by the discovery of an interoffice memo, which had inadvertently been inserted in the envelope with the letter. It said tersely, “Send this jerk the bug letter.”

Dear, patient Lord, please forgive us for being such complainers. Help us, rather, to count our many blessings and to praise your wonderful name for everything you do for us. Amen.