An Email Telling Me To "Let It Go"

I received the following email on July 20, 2008, from Jon Cameron, who I have never heard of before. My emailed reply to it shall follow on this blog posting.

Dave, it seems to often these days that we hear someone trying to grab onto a fist-full of money that isn't theirs. You need to drop the whole "they owe me" crap and get on with your life. Maybe you did do a lot of work/help for them but that does not entitle you to their fortune. Remember, they are the ones that started and owned those camps, not you, so I think they should give the rights/profits to whom ever they wish. My Aunt and Uncle owned a very lucrative buisness and I helped them for years. I would not expect a dime from them after their passing because it was their buisness not mine. If I did recieve something from their estate after they pass-on, I would be greatful for it, but if I didn't, it would not bother me. Nor would I go after anything because it wasn't mine! I don't want to sound mean here, but you should let it go.

Jon


My emailed reply:

I appreciate the email and you trying to help me see things from your point of view, but you are not taking all of the facts into full consideration.

I have never written or said anything to the effect that I am entitled to, or "out to grab", my Uncle Finley and Aunt Martha Clarke's entire fortune. I have publicly acknowledged, on the Internet, that others are most certainly entitled to parts of Martha's estate too. I worked for my Uncle Fin and Aunt Marty as a professional outdoorsman and am entitled to fair monetary compensation for doing so. And since at least 5 years before Finley died, I had been doing my best to make contact with Fin and Marty; first to mend broken family ties, and then to collect the debt they owe to me. They refused to speak to me on the phone, they never replied to my numerous direct mailings to them or ever in any way, shape or form acknowledged anything I had done for them as a professional outdoorsman and bear hunting guide at their Katahdin Lodge. During their lives, they neither thanked me, complimented me nor ever spoke positively about the hard work that I did for them. They had, though, in fact, declared that my written works about my times at Katahdin Lodge are full of lies. But, they never took any legal or personal actions to stop me from publishing my stories on the World Wide Web or sending printed copies of the stories to them and also to many other Patten area Maine residents. They took no actions to stop me because my stories accurately depict my life and adventures at Katahdin Lodge, and Fin and Marty had no real ground to stand on if they had taken legal actions against me. They never called me on the phone or sent me any written correspondence concerning my well written and distributed stories about my life and adventures at Katahdin Lodge. They never wrote out, distributed or published their own versions or rebuttals of the stories either. They were fairly wealthy and powerful, but I am a low income disabled veteran living on a meager, monthly veterans disability pension check and also without any real wealth or power -- except for 'the power of the pen,' and the wealth of my true life stories and Internet abilities. Frankly, I am no match for anyone who has any legitimate reason to stop me from doing anything. I barely survive and maintain a roof over my head from month to month, or day to day at times, and have no monies for paying legal fees or traveling to Maine.

I don't know what you have done for your aunt and uncle's lucrative business, but I performed many days of physically, mentally and emotionally demanding, dangerous, sometimes death defying, oft filthy and stinky, long hours of hard work for my aunt and uncle's lucrative business.

Your email is from a camp "in on the Oxbow" -- as we at Katahdin Lodge used to say -- so you probably know that Maine bear hunting guides routinely track wounded bears at night without a firearm. Did you ever do anything as out of the ordinary as that for your aunt and uncle, as I have done for my Aunt Martha and Uncle Finley?

As a resident of Oxbow, Maine, you must know the rough and tumble road of the section of Rt. 11 that lays between Moro Plantation and Masardis quite well and are able to safely drive it at high speeds. Read my story Driving Northern Mainer Style and you will see that on several occasions I was forced by Fin and Marty to drive it while doing between 70 and 100 MPH the entire way. I drove it at absolute top -- right on the very sharp edge of disaster -- speed for the vehicle I was driving. Did you ever risk your life like that for nothing? I challenge you, or anyone else, to go out early some morning and drive from Katahdin Lodge to Caribou in just under an hour, as I was forced to do several times. The exact route and how I drove it is all laid out in my Driving Northern Mainer Style story. Do that and then see if you want to come back and again tell me it's not something I should be paid for. Have you ever risked your life in such a way for your aunt and uncle? Somehow, Fin and Marty profited from me completing those runs on time. It was good for their business. How have you ever, outright, risked your life for the sole financial benefit of others?

The bottom line is that I was a competent, professional outdoorsman who worked for Fin and Marty, and they did not pay me very much of what I earned from them. I am determined to collect what is an honest debt owed to me.

Something that I find very odd today is that though, many times, I drove up and down Rt 11 past the road which leads in to the Oxbow, I never turned off Rt. 11 and went in there to see what was there. Not even on one of my adventurous and exploratory Sunday drives up that way. A few years ago, I found web sites for some very nice and interesting businesses that are located "in on the Oxbow" and saw that I truly missed out on something good. I wish I had gone in there to see the area and to meet some of the people there. What is your history and life like in on the Oxbow?

(end of my email)

Jon has not replied to my email.


David Robert Crews Copyright 2008

ursusdave
patten maine
katahdin lodge
David Robert Crews