When Dad Isn’t Dear

Y’all know I’m not one for the cheesy Hallmark holidays. My mother has become accustomed to being denied a bouquet of flowers and a Whitman’s Sampler on Mother’s Day, and well, when refer to your father as Fuck Face, Father’s Day is pretty much a no brainer. While I wouldn’t mind having a decent father figure to celebrate, I’m pretty much SOL on that front. My mother had piss poor taste in men. There’s just no getting around that fact. She didn’t just stop at my father, Fuck Face, either. No. Indeed. She went out and got me a step-father, Fuck Head, whose sheer presence in my life made for a reasonably miserable childhood.

Fuck Head is the father of my youngest two sisters, and a man we were well rid of in the mid 80s. My mother, courtesy of my acting out in school and a dose of insight, kicked his ass to the kerb when I was in 10th grade. While it took them way longer and cost way more than it should have to get divorced, eventually he was a distant memory and a bad aftertaste. Periodically through the years he would surface and send a charming note to let us know he was thinking of us. There was the kind note of congratulations when my grandfather, his perceived nemesis, died. Much appreciated correspondence to be sure. However his appearances were few and far between until late last year when there was a schism in my family that led to my youngest sister becoming estranged and finding her way back to Dear Old Fuck Head.

Being the dutiful asshat that Fuck Head is, he began to send us – and I mean by us anyone in my extended family and his – regular missives on a number of topics. Most of them about how evil my family is, apparently a genetic trait going back several generations; a few on the subject of the current state of the economy; and some threatening to sue us for imagined slights we had delivered to him over the 30 years we hadn’t been talking to or about him. He was always thoughtful enough to make sure my husband was cc’d on his emails, and when my husband would email him back and ask him, politely to shut the fuck up, he would reply insisting that I, Surly, stop hacking Dave’s email and pretending to be him. ‘Cause well, y’all know I’m all about the hacking.

Things had been quiet until Fuck Head sent this video in an email last week. He thought I might like it. No idea why. I’m not really a pseudo-sexual ballet kinda gal. Although I love a good tutu. I muttered “WTF?” and went on with my week. I should have known that it was just a feint on his part, that the attack would be coming from another front. While I’m sure the thread, several dozen emails deep, would amuse you all to no end, I thought I would share with you, in the spirit of Father’s Day, the culminating exchange between Fuck Head, my poor bastard of a husband, Dave, and myself. I know, you have your own family dramas to deal with. But frankly I’m pretty damn pleased with my answer. And it’s my blog.

Dear Dave;
You’d be well advised to tell your idiot wife to stop sending e-mails under your e-mail address and under your name. She does not have all 52 cards in her deck.

I understand your frustration, as I was once married to her fucked up Mother, and as such, you undoubtedly have yours hands full.

Just take her out to the wood shed.

All the very best, Fuck Head

Fuck Head-

What you fail to understand, and being that you’re not a terribly bright man I can see how, is that I don’t need to hide behind my husband’s email address to write to you. If I have anything to say to you, I’m happy to do it from my own. I just don’t really care to converse with you. You’re really not of all the much interest to me, so I’ve not bothered for most of this clusterfuck. Frankly, you annoy my husband when he’s not finding your insane drunken rants amusing, and he gets a kick out of watching you get all lathered up in insane double talk. He’s fun like that. So, if he wants to poke you with a stick to see you froth at the mouth and talk crazy, he’s welcome to it. Me? Not so much. You’ve yet to say anything interesting or useful. Or clever.

Let me make this clear – I DO NOT and HAVE NEVER given a rat’s ass what you think of me or my family. I don’t care what you think of my manners, my class, or my education. I don’t care what you have to say about my lesbian sister – and I can assure you neither does she. You are of NO CONSEQUENCE to us. You are a sperm donor at best, and one who wouldn’t pass the rigorous standards of today’s artificial insemination programs. You were a crap father to your own children and an abusive step-father. But the minute you were gone from our lives we ceased to give you a second thought, other than to mock you among ourselves. Because, well, hell, mocking you is fun – and with all the crazy letters, calls, emails, and actions you’ve pulled over the years, you’ve given us plenty to laugh about. It’s probably wrong to make fun of you because you’re delusional and pathetic, but heck. Why spoil a family tradition 30 years in the making. In fact, I think I’ll declare June “Mock Fuck Head Month”. Perhaps I’ll make a commemorative website and post a best-of collection of your insane and threatening emails. I bet it would go viral and we could sell t-shirts with a drawing of your sneering face with spittle on your chin.

You are the only person who wants to hear from you and cares what you have to say. Least of all me. From this point forward I will follow my mother’s lead and send every fucking insane missive from you where it belongs – the trash.

Until such time as I can dance a jig on your shallow grave, go fuck yourself.

Surly

Hope you and yours are having a happy Hallmark family holiday. Don’t strangle Dad with that awesome tie you just gave him.