THE MPF STORY - How it all began
One of the most often asked questions is, "Where did the idea first come from?" Well here are some ramblings as we try to write down where we got the idea from and what the hell it is all about.
Although inklings of this idea had been running around in my head for years with out finding a voice it finally emerged a couple of years ago.
The situation was as follows . . . . well . . . . as far as I can remember that is though nothing is very clear anymore.
The idea behind this project was triggered one
day when I found a book mark inside a book in the library. The book mark was
nothing more than a thin piece of laminated card with a picture of a butterfly
on it. What was interesting about this bookmark however, at least to me, was
the fact it had a girls name written in large green text.
"This bookmark belongs to Gemma. If you should find it please return
it to……." Then there was the girls address. I enjoyed the thought
that this bookmark was so important to someone that they had felt the need
to have their name put on it just in case. They had also laminated it for
protection. The care and effort that had been put into this bookmark was deserving
of one action. - The return of the bookmark.
This made me think about a few things.
1. Here I was with hardly any information about this person but I was forming a picture of them in my mind. My life had been touched by a complete stranger. Someone I would never meet or come into any contact with.
2. I could do a good deed for this complete stranger and in turn touch their life.
3. You could leave things in library books and other people would find them.
4. You could make other peoples lives more interesting.
Not long after this I won £10 on the lottery. I split this into a five pound note and five singles and hid them in library books. This made me feel great. It made me chuckle to my self. Here were six people who would all of a sudden come across this money. They would have something to tell their friends. They would feel special. Like they had been chosen. The power to touch peoples lives in this way was an incredible realisation for me. I decided that one day I would like to spend my life making others peoples lives more interesting.
I had often as a child thought about money and how incredible it was that it was passed from person to person. It didn't really belong to anyone other than the person who happened to have it at the time. Ultimately it was free. Money treats everyone as an equal. There is no race or religion, age or gender to money. I began to be fascinated by the idea of following one single coin or note on its journey through life. The same note could be used for so many different things. It could be stolen from a bank. Used to buy drugs. Used to by a newspaper. Given as change to father. Given to a child for pocket money. Used to buy sweets. Used to pay a paperboy. Used in a video games machine. Taken to the bookies. Used to win at the horses. Taken to the bank and stolen all over again. In an attempt to record the journey of money I have taken to writing, on all bank notes I receive, an email contact address.
These ideas of freedom and the journey through life struck a cord with me but it wasn't until I discovered the bookmark that the idea properly began to take shape. I began to envision a book that travelled, a lost soul, a wanderer. A short while later I heard news of a phone box in the Nevada desert 200miles outside of Las Vegas. Apparently there is a lone phone box which is miles from anywhere and very difficult to find. But it is fully working. It became a cult hit. People would travel from all over the world to visit it. It is now decorated in thousands of presents from different cultures and people. It has even at one point been shot up by a machine gun. Another story that I have heard at some point in my life was the story of this guy who had a large wooden spoon he had won by coming last in some race sometime. His flat mate took it with him on holiday, took photos and posted them back to his stunned friend. While on holiday the guy met some people from New York who took his address and agreed to do the same when they got back home to America and posted more photos. The spoon ended up passing from tourist to tourist around the world for several years. This has been updated in the recent film Amelie which I was pleased to see is a film whose underling message seems to be very similar to my own views.
I noticed how the phone box and the spoon had taken on lives of their own and this I decided was the aim of my book. To create an urban myth, a legend that was passed from person to person, friend to friend. I imagined a time when everyone would say they new someone that had seen the book but I never wanted my own identity to be known. The point of the book is not about the people behind it. It is about the idea itself and the people that it finds. Which is why the inventors shall remain anonymous. If no one knows who is behind it then it adds to the mystery. Maybe no one is behind it. Maybe the book is alive all by itself. Who knows?
I didn't do anything about the book however immediately. In fact I'm sad to say that I didn't do anything about the bookmark either. Well not then anyway. In fact it was several months later before I did anything. I was taking a class at university called experimental aesthetics in which we were encouraged to create new ideas for what art could be and challenge peoples perceptions. Along with several other ideas, I produced the idea for the travelling book. It was greeted well and so I made the book. It was decided that at the end of the term after all the work had been assessed I would leave the book somewhere and start off its travels. Unfortunately due in part to bad weather, in part to madness going on in my personal life and the troublesome problem that I didn't want to say goodbye, the book never got released that summer after all. Several months after I had written the first entry it was still sitting on my book shelf. (The first entry was on my birthday. I like to think of it as the books birthday as well. Sad I know.) I looked at the book and decided that there was no point starting the book now it was autumn and the weather was turning bad. I would wait until the anniversary of the book and then realise it. This would give me time to organise some kind of weather proofing etc. A full year after having the initial idea I finally got round to sending my book out into the world. It was quite an interesting experience and I will hopefully try to do it justice one day. The book had begun and the network of people who it had touched began to grow.
A quick point of note. Several months ago I finally got round to posting that girl her bookmark. Almost two years since she had lost it. I sent her a Christmas card with it inside. I also gave her my email address so that she could let me now if it reached the right person. Just before the new year I got a very pleased but surprised reply. I had touched a stranger.
But why you may ask. What's the point of all this? Well I see that there are several. In fact there are many, too many. I forget some reasons, remember others and it changes from day to day. Apologises if I waver and repeat myself or go off on a tangent or something but I have so many ideas and reasons behind this book I tend to rattle around a little.
Firstly the book is completely free. It is not tied to any government or corporation.
It also does not belong to any individual. In the original book I wrote -
"Hi My name is <name> and this is my book." I then had to
correct myself by saying. "Well no that's not quite right. This book
was my idea but I don't suppose it belongs to anyone really. Except maybe
to the world at large."
This is a very important point. There is very little left in the world that someone is not trying to claim ownership or rights over. Trees, rivers, mountains someone somewhere has claimed them all. So that they can use them for resources or to sell on. The bottom line to make money. Air space??? Even the sky above land is owned by people. How can that be possible? How can anyone claim ownership of the air? Only by being completely free can this book accurately record the ideas of the people living in the world today.
The book is about connecting strangers. To make people of different backgrounds
and different cultures see things from different points of view. Each person
that finds the book is touched by it in a deep and personal way. They as an
individual are connecting with complete strangers in a very personal way.
They can be more honest ad open than they could be in any other medium.
This book comes from out of the blue and enters their life. They fill it in
and then its gone. They may not wish it to go but once it has gone they will
always have their memory of it. They will always have the knowledge that out
of the millions of people on the earth they were one of the lucky ones to
find this book. They are joining a very exclusive club. You can't deliberately
join this club. Money can't buy you in to it. You do not find it. It finds
you. Everyone in the world wants to feel important. Its easy to feel lost
in an infinite universe where there are ten billion, billion galaxies and
in each galaxy a billion, billion stars and round these stars there are billions
and billions and billions of planets, we can feel overpowered very easily.
The book is about the freedom of speech and trying to find new ways for us to communicate. We are trying to spread information in a way that it would have been centuries before, by word of mouth. Our modern age is called the information age. News flies round the world in a second. Every body is in such a hurry to find out what's going on. Info flashes by our heads wherever we are. But it's impersonal. It has no connection with who we are. With a thousand different channels, magazines, newspapers, websites etc there is such a need for news and information that even the most meaningless titbits are given importance. We want to create a set of information and thoughts that are actually important to people. Things which are passed down from person to person because its something we want to share not because we want to fill up space in a tabloid.
The book is also about freeze framing time. It is like one of those time capsules they fire off into space full of the things important to society at the time. This book will hopefully better capture an honest view of what the thoughts and feelings of people are. What people really care about! No one shares the same thoughts. Two peoples views of exactly the same experience will be different. How does the thoughts of someone you've never met affect you?
From what people say this book helps to make them, the individual feel a part of something bigger. The idea that the universe is nothing but a chaotic mess can be hard to fathom. By making people connect with a hundred strangers around the world in such a detailed and personal, one to one way, it helps them to feel more united with humanity.
They realise that we are all equal and united
in our individuality and also in the fact that in our heads we are alone.
Everybody wants to matter. Everyone wants to feel that they are important.
This book will hopefully make people think about what that really means and
what they really want.
I am trying to connect a network of people. People who will never meet each
other and have nothing in common except for this book. It's a very pure and
simplistic idea.
Of course the next person to find it might very well decide to set fire to it and so end the entire dream. Lets hope that they don't for all our sakes. Although it is their right to do so if they wish. The book of course will face hardships. The winter in particular must have been tough. To try and prepare it for the real world I varnished it several times in Ronseal (it does exactly as it says on the tin) quick drying wood varnish and ran candle wax along the papers edges. I wonder what it looks like now?
I remembered about the idea of making peoples lives more interesting. This seems like the ideal way to do so. One day I would love to spend my life making life more interesting for others, until then I will settle for this. Apparently Tommy Cooper used to always try and make other peoples lives more interesting. He would deliberately go out of his way to give people something to talk about. When he used taxies he would always pay his fare and give the driver a fair tip. Then when getting out he would reach over and say. "Here's a little something for you." and pop what look like a bank note in the drivers top pocket. The driver would later discover it to be a fresh tea bag.
The pleasure I get from just knowing that this book exists is enough for me. I can picture the looks of total puzzlement on peoples faces when they sit on a bench and see that smooth black cover with the sharp white letters "read me" on them. How can they resist such an offer. Indeed I believe the person that finds it and doesn't read it deserves a prize of some kind.
A couple of quick answers to things people have asked -
The idea for the front cover is obviously lifted from Alice in Wonderland when she finds the small bottle with drink me written on it and the cake with eat me written on it. Gladly it appears that people share in Alice's curiosity.
The name on the back of the book and the title of this project is missing presumed found?. Again this is an obvious link to the saying missing presumed lost. Which was said in connection with soldiers during the war who went missing on the battle field.
I would like to thank every one who has become involved in this idea and I thank you for your emails and kind words. Stay in touch with news of the books travels, or anything else that you think might interest us. And to my first book, wherever you are, I wish you luck and I hope that one day I'll see you again.
Yours
mpf
