  I like to go back and forth about my Daddy,  I love him,  no doubt about that,  but he was far from perfect,  and that's kinda tough for me to reconcile.  In my life he plays the role of both super-
hero and villain.  Today he gets to be a villain.  Just so you know,  though,  I can talk shit about him,  you can't.
 I've heard a lot of people say things about him that were less than complementary,  and regardless of whether or not what they're saying is true,  it still both hurts and angers me.  That said:  My Daddy was a bit of a ladies man,  he did his best to hide it from me when I was little,
 and me being a little on the slow side,  he mostly succeeded.  By the time I was 13 or so I figured out that all those " naps"  he took with Eva,  Suzie,
 Renee,  Jeanie,  Susan,  Pam,  and the rest of his " friends"
 ( Daddy didn't ever have any of his male friends over,  in fact,  the only men I can remember coming to our house were the husbands of the women he was sleeping with,  how uncomfortable!  probably didn't involve a whole lot of sleeping.
 But by then,  he was married again,  so all of his extracurricular activities had to be done outside of the house anyway.  As far as I know,  he met all of his girlfriends at school;  most of them were students who had come to him for counseling.
 In his defense,  he was a single father,  and he didn't really have a social life to speak of,  so that was pretty much his only opportunity to meet women,  but still,  he was their COUNSELOR,
 and it's just bad form to seduce troubled young women who come to you for help.  He had charisma coming out his ears,  I don't really see that he was that attractive,  at least by the time I was born,  but what he lacked in brawn,  he made up for in brains,
 and all these poor tortured souls who came to him,  asking for advise on their love lives just ate that shit up.  He'd counsel them for a month or so,  and then he'd start inviting them to go places with us on the weekends.  Nothing special,  if they had kids of their own,
 we'd all go to the park,  or go out for pizza at one of the places with a playground,  otherwise we'd just go out for lunch,  or feed the ducks.  They were all really nice to me too,  at least at first.
 I'm not sure what gene makes women go gaga over the children of the man they're involved with,  but it's definitely ingrained.  After a couple of weekend outings I always started getting little presents,  books mostly,  although a few of them tried to buy me little dresses ( I didn't really start wearing dresses until I was a teenager,
 I was a bit of a tom- boy,  and it's really hard to climb a tree in a dress)  and one ( she didn't last very long)  bought me a Barbie,
 I don't even remember her name,  but I remember that stupid doll,  I was about 8,  and it was my first Barbie,  I just couldn't figure out what the appeal was,  in fact I still don't get it.
Anybody know what you're supposed to DO with Barbie’ s?  Generally a few weeks after the presents started,  the girls started coming over,  if they were single there were sleepovers,  the married ones just took naps.
 The amazing thing to me is that I never questioned that as a kid,  it was normal to me,  and I never even considered the idea that something more could be going on.  I did know that the naps especially weren't to be talked about,  and I was even given cover stories to relate to the husbands in the event I was questioned,  (
it's not lying if you repeat what your Daddy told you to say,  it's just not)  usually the cover story involved me,  like they were teaching me how to knit,  giving me piano lessons,  and my personal favorite,
 tutoring me in math ( I was better at math by the time I was 8 or 9 than at least half of the girls Daddy dated,  and occasionally,  just to keep up appearances they would actually try to teach me something,  I was under strict orders not to embarrass them)  For the most part I saw these girls as temporary distractions,
 I knew they wouldn't last,  they never did,  but occasionally,  I would really hit it off with one of them,  and that always made the break- ups hard.
 One in particular hung around for the longest time,  and then kept coming back every year or so,  until Renee ( that's the evil step- mother,  of all the girls,
 why'd he have to marry that bitch?  finally threatened divorce if she wasn't declared persona non grata.  Her name was Suzie,  and she was a real sweetheart most of the time.  She got a little crazy when it came to Daddy though,  I guess she was really in love,
 bless her heart.  Daddy broke up with her for the umpteenth time when he started seeing Renee seriously ( Renee was still married at this point,  but what're you gonna do?  They had a HUGE fight,  that led to Daddy being hospitalized,
 ( he had 3 heart attacks that day,  we didn't have a phone,  and I had to run down to the neighbors house to call an ambulance,  all the while,  Suzie was still screaming)
 I remember Suzie coming into my room,  in the middle of the night,  and trying to explain to me that she loved me,  but wasn't going to get to see me anymore.  I'd heard it before,  but then she started talking trash,
 I remember her saying,  " you know how your father can be"  and for some reason that just set me off.  I was fiercely protective of him,  I'd been listening to her scream at him ad nauseum for hours,
 and I'd begged her to stop yelling when he'd been laying there,  almost dying.  I told her I never wanted to see her again.  Strangely enough,  she's actually the only one of the women in his life that I still keep in contact with,  but I've still never quite forgiven her for that day.
 OK I don't have a neat ending for this post,  but I think I'm done now.  & nbsp;
