sybil

Photo: Corinne Day

(This post is not about Kate Moss. It's about my dad's love life.)

My dad is a pretty funny guy, and like me, he also seems to have a high tolerance for questionable behavior. But on occasion, one encounters someone so spectacularly insane that the story cannot be told without many pauses for bursts of laughter and clarification that what was said wasn't just being embellished for dramatic effect. The saga of the "really attractive, cannot-imagine-how-she-could-be-single woman" who he'd recently invited to a wedding, falls into this category.

It went like this. Dad meets (seemingly) lovely woman through a mutual friend. They go out and it goes really well. He has a wedding coming up in a month, and knowing that ladies like to be given ample time to strategize clothing options for significant events, he (perhaps prematurely, considering) asks her to be his date. She obliges, and it all pretty much goes downhill from here.

Shedding her facade of normalcy, she starts calling my dad to share increasingly worrisome details of her life. Two to three times a day, every day. This is after one date. He didn't answer. So, she left voicemails.

"...You know, I didn't get my period while i was anorexic."

"...Both of my parents used to sexually abuse me."

"Hey there scooterboot..." (Note: my dad is no one's "scooterboot." And more importantly, that's not even a real word.)
"I just got back from the doctor's. Turns out I have fluid on my pelvis."

"Today isn't going so well. My mom came into my room again last night. When will this end?!"(turns out that "mom came into my room again last night" was not further alleged sexual abuse, but merely 3am vacuuming, which she found very inappropriate)
"...still have the fluid on my pelvis..."

"Why aren't you calling me back, mister man?!" (I added "man" at the end of mister for emphasis, but she did call him "mister" on numerous occasions.) 

I think my dad did everyone a favor by not responding to any of these calls, but she was obviously not getting the hint. So he finally called her back and said that they should probably discuss the wedding (while silently plotting how he could get out of this without creating a fatal attraction scenario). Unsurprisingly, taking the rational high-road quickly led to the disintegration of all remaining shards of sanity. For one, apparently my dad should not have felt special, as she was leaving similar voicemails for "at least six other friends." Jesus. I don't know about you, but I try to spare my friends the details of my lady troubles, especially those who I've just begun dating. 

Long story short, he told her that he wouldn't be taking her to the wedding. To this she responded with eerie calmness that that was fine because if he couldn't be there for her, she was better off. That sounds like a direct threat to me. However he's assured me that, sensing her instability, he made sure that she didn't know where he lived. Like that's ever stopped a crazy woman. Anyway, we're hoping for the best. On the upside, it's making for some really entertaining impersonations.