Open Letter To Mason, the Gas Lighter

 

A Modest Rebuke to the Astonishingly Misinformed Mr. Mason

It is with the gravest (most serious) concern for the state of factual discourse (discussion) that I take up my quill to address the bewildering (confusing) pronouncement (statement) of one Mr. Dave Mason, who, in a dazzling (impressive) display of Olympian ignorance (lack of knowledge), has declared that Sir Elton John has never so much as set foot in a domicile (home) beyond the verdant (green) shores of England. One must marvel (wonder) at the confidence with which Mr. Mason has flung himself into the chasm (deep hole) of public error, as though the abyss (void) itself would catch him and whisper, "Fear not, for truth is what you feel it to be."

Were his assertion (claim) no more than the misstep of a common buffoon (fool), a slip of the tongue from an inebriated (drunk) reveler (partygoer), or the delusion (false belief) of a man who believes his dreams to be history, one might let it pass with a chuckle and an affectionate shake of the head. But no, Mr. Mason has proclaimed his folly (foolishness) with the zeal (passion) of a medieval inquisitor (religious enforcer), armed not with facts but with the cudgel (blunt weapon) of obstinacy (stubbornness), beating against the gates of reason with all the force of a damp sponge.

Let us, then, conduct a brief and charitable education for Mr. Mason, lest his error be mistaken for wisdom by the unwary (unaware). First, we must call forth the evidence—documents, deeds, and declarations—each a damning indictment (accusation) against his thesis (argument). Lo! In the sunlit grandeur (magnificence) of Mont Boron, in Nice, stands Elton John's French villa (large house), a monument to taste and refinement (elegance), defying with its very bricks the absurd (ridiculous) notion that he has never possessed a dwelling (residence) beyond England’s hedgerows (bushy boundaries). Perhaps Mr. Mason believes this villa to be a mirage (illusion), conjured by Mediterranean heat, but alas! It is listed among the great singer’s residences, an indelible (permanent) blemish upon the parchment (paper) of his fable (fictional story).

Should we take pity on Mr. Mason and assume he merely overlooked France? We cannot. For then we must escort him to the shores of North America, where upon the vibrant (lively) avenues of Atlanta, Georgia, Sir Elton reclines (rests) in his penthouse (luxury apartment), overlooking a city that would, by Mr. Mason’s reckoning (calculation), exist only in the fevered (intensely imagined) imagination of cartographers (mapmakers). There he has dwelled (lived) for years, amidst (among) his vast collection of photographs, each one perhaps whispering to him, "Dave Mason knows not what he speaks."

And let us not forget the stately (grand) majesty (splendor) of Toronto, where Elton John once graced The Bridle Path with his presence, his home a testament (proof) to luxury in a country that, if we are to trust Mr. Mason’s narrative (story), exists solely as a figment (illusion) of collective delusion (false belief). Perhaps he believes Canada to be but a northern extension of Essex, and the people therein to be Englishmen who have tragically (unfortunately) lost their way in the snow.

Indeed, if we are to follow Mr. Mason’s logic, one might propose that Elton John is in fact a being of spectral (ghostly) quality, bound forever to the green fields of England, incapable of materializing (appearing) elsewhere save as an apparition (ghostly figure). One might imagine that when he performs in Las Vegas, he must slip between realms (dimensions), a wraith (spirit) appearing only under the limelight before dissolving into mist, his corporeal (physical) form tethered (tied) to some oak-lined estate in Berkshire.

One is left to wonder, then, why the noble Mr. Mason insists upon his preposterous (absurd) claim. Is it a jest (joke)? A test of our collective patience? A declaration of war against the very concept of geography? Or is he, like the flat-earthers of old, simply a man too enchanted (charmed) with his own fictions (false beliefs) to let reality intrude? Whatever the case, we must urge the man, with the utmost compassion, to lay down his sword of error and embrace the warm, illuminating (enlightening) glow of evidence.

For while we may forgive a man for misplacing his spectacles (glasses), or even, in times of great distress, for misplacing his trousers (pants), we cannot so easily excuse the misplacement of truth itself.