16: My Father is Found
Originally emailed on August 5, 1998
Hey there.
My father has been found. Late last week, he used his credit card to get cash from a machine at a casino on a reservation outside Mandan, North Dakota. When the police picked him up, he was very drunk and in the company of a "lady friend" he'd met in Fargo the previous week. She was also very drunk. The police "encouraged" him to return home and answer questions and he has done so, but he hasn't been charged with anything. His story is that he was on vacation, that he had my mother's permission to pawn her rings, and that he intended all along to return home at the end of August, when his vacation was to end. He claims to be shocked and grieved by my mother's death, the lady friend notwithstanding. He also claims that, due to "short-term memory loss associated with aging" (read: blackouts) he cannot provide many details of his trip or explain how he came to be in North Dakota.
Nobody, with the possible exception of my thick-headed sister EmmyLou, believes he was on vacation, for crying out loud, but there's precious little evidence to contradict his story, and some evidence that supports it. For instance, my mother didn't tell anyone he had left her, and he did mail the pawn tickets for the rings to her, "as we had agreed," he says. No one suspects foul play in my mother's death. The only thing there is hard evidence of is adultery, not exactly one of your more prosecutable crimes. Is it even a crime? I'd have to look that up. Besides, "technically, we don't have evidence of adultery," as one police officer pointed out, "because, although your father was unaware of the fact, your mother was dead before he became involved with the lady from Fargo."
My father even retrieved his car from impound, and he sent a nice letter to the police apologizing for his "error" in "accidentally" leaving it parked in a handicapped spot at the bus station "rather than in one of the properly designated long-term parking areas."
So, he's home in Chesaning again. Because he missed the first one, he wants to have a second memorial service for my mother and is, according to my sister, in the process of planning one. "It's so touching," she said to me, "to see him wanting to lay her to rest properly."
"What's his angle? Is he just trying to look innocent and bereaved in case the police come up with something to charge him with?" I asked.
"Louella, you always suspect the worst of our father. He doesn't have an angle. In fact, he's asking people to bring money instead of flowers, to donate to our mother's favorite charity."
"So, people are being asked to send a check in her name to, say, the local chapter of Alcoholics Anonymous?"
"Oh, no," EmmyLou said. "He says it's much simpler if we just bring cash or write a check to him, and then he'll send one check to the charity. It simplifies their bookkeeping."
I sighed. "I'm not coming to this one," I said. "It's ridiculous to have a second service because the drunken husband of the deceased was in North Dakota -- North Dakota, for chrissakes! -- with some bimbo and didn't know his wife was dead! I can't believe anyone would participate in such a farce!"
"Oh, lots of people will be there, Louella," EmmyLou said. "People who care about our father, people who understand what he's going through, people who want to show their support."
"People too dumb to realize our father is using our mother's death to bilk friends and relations out of money for booze," I added helpfully.
"Think what you will, Louella," Em said. "It's just as well you'll be staying away." She hung up.
I've been going to four Al-Anon meetings a week but I think there's another one on Thursday mornings at 7:15 that I can squeeze in before work. Twelve steps are just not always enough.
I had dinner with Michael, Sam's boyfriend, the other week. We both knew we were there to talk about why he is still dating my jerk of an ex-husband when it had seemed clear previously that he was going to break up with him. So we didn't waste too much time on preliminaries. As soon as we'd ordered our food, I said, "So, he turned on the charm, did he?"
Michael said, "You make it sound so deliberate, so manipulative. But yes. Anyway, I like Sam, and I like being with him. And I figure, even if he does put on an act for me -- pretending to be more interested in fatherhood than he really is -- it's good for the boys to be around him."
"So you're sticking together for the sake of the children?" I teased him.
"Laugh if you will, Louella, but if fear of losing me makes Sam act like a better man than he is, well, maybe in time it won't be an act.." I like Michael. I hope Sam doesn't break his heart too badly.
Ed and I seem to be having a weirdness. I'm not quite sure what it's about. The other night I told him that I had bought tickets to the annual choir recital at Nona's church, and he said, "Well, you should have asked me first, Ella, because I won't go."
I said, "But it's a good concert. Nona's church has four choirs: men, women, mixed, and a youth choir, and they're all good. Last year Nona had a big solo, and they didn't just do religious music. They did some gospel, but they also sang some jazz and blues, and Nona says this year they're doing a bunch of slave spirituals and African-American folk songs. I thought you'd be interested in it."
Ed said, "I'm sure the choirs are very good, but I'm afraid I can't go."
I said, "Why not?"
"I won't go to church," Ed said.
"But it's not like going to church," I protested. "There's no service. It's just singing."
"I won't go," Ed said.
"Not even to support Nona? It means a lot to her when friends come, and I already told her we'd be there."
"I'll just have to show my friendship for Nona in other ways," Ed said.
"I paid $30 for the tickets!" I said. "I don't want them to just go to waste!"
"You should have asked me before you spent that much money," Ed said. "And there's no reason you can't go. Invite someone else to use the other ticket."
"Ed, it's just a choir concert! I just don't see what the big deal is," I said.
"Ella, it's a big deal. I don't want to talk about it, I just want you to accept that I am not going to church with you."
"Ed, I'm not inviting you to church. I'm inviting you to a concert," I said.
"A concert in a church," Ed said.
"Well, yes," I answered.
"With performances by church choirs," he continued.
"Yes," I said.
"Singing church music."
"Yes."
"I won't go."
"I already bought the tickets, I told Nona we'd be there, and now I'm going to have to renege because you're being -- I don't even know what you're being. Will you at least tell me why you won't go?" I said.
"Ella, no, I won't tell you. I'll say this much: me going to church is like an alcoholic going into a bar."
"What," I said, "you're afraid you'll start praying and won't be able to stop?"
"It's not funny, Louella," he said. "It's serious. And I wish you'd just drop it."
"How can I drop it when you're being so unreasonable?" I asked.
Ed said, "Louella, drop it now or I'm leaving."
"I would drop it," I said, "except that it's all so mysterious. Why won't you tell me --"
"I'm leaving," Ed said. And he did.
Looking back, maybe I did push him a little. It's just that, even though we talk about all kinds of things, there are some things he just won't talk about at all. I hardly know what he did before he came to Lansing a few years ago, except that he worked as a stockbroker. He won't even tell me where he lived. It's not like he says, "I won't tell you that," but he changes the subject. He'll be telling me a story about, oh, some time when he woke up one morning to find that almost two dozen bats had come in through a hole in the wall during the night and were roosting on the ceiling of his bedroom, and I'll say, "where were you living then?" and he'll say, "oh, in a little house I was renting." "Well, where was the house?" "About half an hour from my job." "No, I mean, what town was it in?" "Oh, you haven't heard of it." "What was it near?" "It wasn't near anything. That's why I liked it. It was very quiet" He can keep this up for hours.
Anyway, now I'll call and apologize for prying, and he'll accept my apology, but this will still be between us: that there are some things he won't tell me, and that until I know what those things are, I can't quite trust him all the way.
I've got a spare ticket to a choir concert. Ya wanna go?
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