Assisted Loving (9 page)

O
ne day, when I'm running out of ways to entertain myself while entertaining my father, I bring him an application for
Who Wants to Marry My Dad?
, a new network reality show. I'm not naive. I know the kind of Dads they're looking for. David Hasselhoff Dads. Bruce Willis Dads. Randy, divorced Dads. Dads who are catnip to hot broads in their late thirties, women who are, like most of my single women friends, a volatile combination of picky and desperate. At a certain point, any man can look reclaimable, I guess. One of my editors tells me that, when he was in high school, his father, a free-spirited anthropology professor, started supplementing his income by working as an exotic male dancer. And the women were all over him, a constantly changing cast of chorus girls. That's the kind of father who's reality-TV-ready, not mine.

It's a warm summer afternoon, and we are sitting on the balcony of the Centra, application and pen in hand. The building is its usual ecosystem of widowed wildlife. Birds everywhere, and a few old mallards with droopy feathers. But mostly it's a female population. There are great blue-haired herons who fish through their handbags for lipstick, and adorable clucking hens who gossip and knit. Loons with jet black dye jobs. Plump robins and mynah birds with sharp Bronx accents that my father finds unpleasant. They flock to the dining hall and elevators. They perch at card tables, picking at cookies and decaffeinated tea—well-dressed women with standards, glancing over at us. Most are attractive, like so many women in Great Neck. “Nice-looking ladies,” I tell Dad.

He shakes his head. “Not what I'm looking for,” he mutters.

Everyone in this building, to his mind, is too senior for him, too over the hill. Actually, many are not. They just happen to live here like he does because it's easier than living alone. But he sees himself as Joe-on-the-Go, just using the place as a perch, not a nest. He doesn't want to face the fact that he's elderly. Life still interests him.

So we turn to the
Who Wants to Marry My Dad?
application, making sure to lower both his age and weight. Some of the questions require little thought. “What's the main quality you look for in a potential mate?” I ask him. “Flexibility,” he answers. “Okay, I'll put that down,” I say. Of course I'd like to suggest that “submissive” would be a more accurate response, but I don't editorialize. To the question, “What kind of person will you absolutely not date?” his response is “Fat.”

“Do your children's opinions affect who you date?”

“Yes, absolutely.”

Okay. But if he relies on my opinions, he might end up alone the rest of his life. That certainly seems to be the direction I'm heading.

“What was the craziest date you've ever been on?”

“Probably the time I ended up in my friend Jack's bed at Bard College,” he says, smiling at the memory. “He wasn't in it at the time. But he showed up in the middle of the night with a girl. My presence took all the romance out of his evening.”

“So I'll just put down ménage à trois, okay?”

“Sure, why not?” he laughs.

I don't know why I can't picture my father in his twenties having dating shenanigans and high-jinx when he's having all kinds of dating shenanigans sixty years later.

“When was that date? Were you playing the field at the time?”

“It was 1949, after college, just before I met your mother. I dated a lot in those days. But mostly I found that the women I got set up with were nothing extra.”

“And Mom was something extra?

He sits up straight. His smile becomes almost sad, remembering her as young.

“Yes. She was gorgeous, a lovely country girl compared to the ones I was meeting. She didn't come loaded down with a lot of problems.”

“So did you have to woo her?”

“The summer before we got married I was on Long Island and she was upstate with her family. We wrote letters because long-distance calls were so expensive.”

He makes it sound easy. But I remember my mother telling me he was hard to nail down. He made it up to
see her that summer only a couple of times. She was even in the hospital for surgery and he didn't come up. She'd write him lighthearted letters as “Your Lonesome Gal,” telling him she loved him. Then she'd thank him profusely when he did finally drive up to visit. My mother had no shortage of romantic opportunities. But there was something about my father—this funny, earnest bachelor—that rang her chimes. They met at a Zionist Club meeting at the Bay Shore Jewish Center. It didn't hurt that he was a good-looking man with his own law practice. More than that, he had a sense of fun and romance, and an ability to turn anything into a sing-along. He was sentimental and affectionate, something almost impossible to find in men back then.

“I appreciate your coming up, honey, thanks so much,” my mother wrote him from her parents' house in 1950. “You know if marriage is a matter of give and take, I think we both have what it takes.” Somehow, they did, but without her ability to be flexible and easily amused, their marriage would have never have lasted so long.

There are more questions on the
Who Wants to Marry My Dad?
application, some too cringe-inducing for me to ask aloud. (“Describe a romantic evening” and “What is the biggest contribution to your sexual views?” Who the hell would ever ask such a thing of his father?) It's easier to ask him to list three talents he has. Dad thinks a moment, then says, “Put down making up parodies, dancing, and bridge.”

“Okay. Last question, Dad. They want you to list your bad habits.”

“And how much room do they leave?”

“Two lines,” I laugh.

“Write small,” he says.

So I do. And while he lists a few, a longer list accumulates in my mind. He's always late. He's sloppy and absentminded. He chews with his mouth open and is prone to unforeseeable rages over nothing. He is controlling, willful, profligate in advice giving and matchmaking, even when people aren't asking and don't want to be set up. He'd rather talk than listen. He loves changing plans. He keeps you on the phone, even when it's obvious you don't want to talk. He writes postcards to people he hasn't seen in ages. His bridge habit is actually an addiction that makes him miserable when he can't play. And when he does, he gives too much advice to his partners. He remains a rabid Republican. He veers into the middle lane when driving. And lately, I've been appalled to see that, in addition to the ballpoint pens he keeps in the front pocket of his shirt, he has toothpicks that he pulls out at all the wrong moments. Like now. We are sitting among his fellow Centra residents, all out enjoying the late-afternoon sun on his building's big terrace, and he starts picking at his teeth and making a sucking noise. Appalling.

“Dad, would you mind? Save it for your bathroom.”

Fortunately, he doesn't take it personally today. But pity the poor date who dares to criticize him if he's in the wrong mood. Who wants to marry my dad? There are days when I think nobody. And the more I talk about his dating travails to my friends, the more I hear similar stories. It turns out I'm not the only bemused child sucked into a senior father's mating melee. One friend has an upstanding dad who picked up a woman on a commuter train and dropped her straight into the family without so
much as a word of explanation. Two sisters I know are totally flummoxed by a shy Connecticut father in his seventies, very recently widowed, who has taken up with a married woman in her forties. I hear stories of men whose dying wives leave them lists of women they approve of for dating after they're gone. I hear about an “intervention,” in which a family removes a father from a woman about to marry him and take him for all his money. One friend tells me that when her rapscallion dad moved into her apartment after his fifth divorce, he started lobbying her prettiest friends to set him up with their mothers. “I ended up racing to the phone every time it rang so he wouldn't answer it,” she says. “It was horrible.”

My favorite story is one about a friend's father in his late seventies, recently widowed, and also legally blind for thirty years. At his country club, the women circle around him like ducks to bread. One widow, in her seventies, white-haired and overweight, flirts with him, and he flirts back. She recently confided to my friend that she loves flirting with her father because the last time he was able to see her she was still young and thin.

In June, for my Father's Day column, I write about Dad's big hunt for new love in his old age, touching on both the amusement of knowing he still has so much potential ahead of him and the unseemliness of the notion that, at eighty, he wants to have what he calls intimacy with women. He's a good sport about it and doesn't seem to mind being material for me. He's always trying to tell me what to write about anyway. So there's some satisfaction for him in being my topic. And the column gets a good response. One reader, a woman with a seventy-one-year-old mother, is moved to write:

Yes of course it's about his happiness, not mine. But that doesn't mean it's easy to stop passing judgment. I have more opinions than anyone I know.

So many, it seems there's hardly any room for feelings.

M
y father's black tassel loafers are not the kind you see in a doorman building on Fifth Avenue. They have a kind of discount store quality to them. I have to rely on my imagination here if I'm to get a picture of his big date with Florence. The only thing I know is that, much to my surprise, the woman who set them up has reported back to me he was found to be “a delightful conversationalist.” So now I'm all ears for his report. What does this Florence look like? What does her apartment look like? What details do I get from him? Nothing! For all the times he wants to tell me about all the things in his life that don't interest me at all, now,
now
, when I'm dying to know every single detail, he is being terse and vague.

“I just picked her up at her apartment and took her to a nice dinner,” he's telling me.

“So where'd you go?”

“An Italian place she likes.”

“Which one? Gino's? Serafina?”

“I can't remember. Food was overpriced. Place was overcrowded, like everywhere else in the city. Our next date will be in Great Neck.”

“Did you pay?”

“We went Dutch.”

“Oh no, Dad! Why?”

“She insisted.”

“So was she nice?”

“She was fine. Younger than me. Good figure. Very bright.”

“So what did you talk about?”

“I can't remember. But listen, the ball game's starting. We'll catch up tomorrow.”

How dare he? I'm the one who gives him the bum's rush to get him off the phone, not vice versa. And what is wrong with me anyway, obsessing about his date with the fancy rich lady? Now I can't sleep. In my restless mind I'm reviewing his night with Florence. My version has the scratchy and jumpy quality of an old home movie.

Here's how I imagine it:

He pulls his junk mobile up to an imposing residential building on Fifth Avenue, where he finds a convenient parking space. Miracle on Eighty-fourth Street! Suddenly, his tenuous relationship with Manhattan—the crowds, the dirt, the Democrats, the cost of parking—is all resolved for the evening, and he feels happy and light
on his feet. He's in a new white button-down shirt, clean chinos, and a blue blazer just back from the dry cleaner. Jaunty. Dating is starting to teach him to dress better. If it weren't for his gimpy walk, he might be Gene Kelly. The stern doorman shows him right in. He whizzes up in a wood-paneled elevator, pulling a dirty comb from the pocket of his blazer to get his hair into place. There, at the top floor, is a woman looking fifteen years his junior, hair auburn and recently done, waiting at her door.

“Joe? Hello. You're late. I'm Florence. Come in!”

She's brusque. He could be daunted. She looks, as he likes to say, hoity-toity in a white linen suit and—what are those, pearls?—like some of the snootier Palm Beach dames who don't give him the time of day. But he's in his easy-breezy mode tonight, looking good, feeling good, allergies well medicated with a cocktail of pills. And she hasn't had a date in months, so why not give this gentleman a fair shake?

“Please pardon the mess,” she tells him. “I'm packing for Sun Valley.”

“Don't think anything of it,” he says.

He wonders to himself,
What is she talking about?
There's no mess. The place is immaculate. The kind of home he's seen only on TV. Views of the park. Grand piano with Liberace candelabra. Big vases of flowers like he's seen only at Ritz-Carlton brunches. A lady named Inez in an apron brings him a whiskey sour and tiny bowl of warm nuts. He uses the only Spanish he knows to tell her,
“Muchas gracias.”
The tumbler is made of heavy crystal. And those oil paintings with bronze lights over them are by someone famous, he thinks. One is of a bespectacled, imposing bald man.

“That was my late husband, Art,” she says.

“Good-looking guy,” Dad says. “What was his line of work?”

Okay. Five minutes in, and he's already broken two cardinal rules of first dates: Don't inquire about the ex, and never lead by talking about what anyone does for a living.

But she doesn't seem to mind. She sips her dry martini, big gold bracelets jangling, and explains he was a manufacturer—gynecological instruments—something that leaves even Joe Morris without much to say. So there's a moment of silence.

But then the conversation moves on from Sun Valley, a place where she spends summers and Dad has never been, to Palm Beach, where they both go for the winter.

“Whereabouts are you located there?” he asks.

“Sunset Avenue, near The Breakers.”

“Terrific area. I eat at Chuck and Harold's all the time.”

“I used to more often. But the new chef tends to overcook things.”

“Works for me. I like everything well done.”

“Well, it's a free country,” she says.

The woman, this Florence, is no slouch. She runs with discriminating crowds in the three places she has her homes. And she doesn't miss a trick when it comes to assessing new people. For instance, she notices, as she and my father walk to Madison Avenue for dinner, that this gentleman caller, Joe Morris, is not as quick moving as she would have liked. And yet there's something boyish about him. His skin is almost without a wrinkle, and there's something about him that's smooth without being slick, open and affable, and she likes the
way he talks as if he hasn't a care in the world, a kind of Jewish Tony Bennett. Okay, she could live without the slights about Muslims and the Pope he makes over dinner. And she finds it a little surprising when he pulls some sweetener from his wallet and dumps it in his glass of wine. And perhaps it would be more pleasant if his table manners were better, and he finished chewing before speaking. Also, those eyeglasses—just like the ones George Bush Sr. wears—why are they so smudged? But as they chat about bridge, Palm Beach, Great Neck, and, of course, me, she can't help but be a little more than charmed. She finds my dad delightful, even when he pockets some Equal packets from the table.

It isn't until Dad is walking her home, sweetly crooning all the lyrics to “I Love New York in June,” that she gets a little twisting in her gut. That can't be something romantic stirring down below her silk blouse, can it? In front of her building, with her doorman watching protectively, he wishes her a lovely summer in Sun Valley, kisses her hand, and finishes by crooning “I'll Be Seeing You.” She walks into her elevator, flushed, with hearts, stars, and little twittering birdies circling around her dignified head.

At least that's how I imagine it.

So why, after she liked him, is he now talking about scaring up other dates? They only met two weeks ago. We've just gotten back to his apartment after a pleasant dinner next door at a Greek place. It's a lovely summer night, but of course every window is shut. I open them all. He frowns at the fresh air and sits down at his table, piled high with papers and pill bottles.

“So Florence wants to see you again, Dad? That's great.”

“Yes, well, it's mutual. Trouble is, she's in Sun Valley all summer.”

“So maybe you should fly out there for a weekend and surprise her.”

“Are you kidding? That mountain altitude would be the worst thing for my heart.”

“So you won't chase her, huh?”

He leans in and stares me down with a smarmy smile. “No. But I hope she's chaste because she won't be
chased
by me.”

I laugh. “But why not chase her, Dad? What could be the harm?”

“Look, I'm not going to see her again until Palm Beach. That's six months away. So I'm not taking myself off the market yet, that's all.”

My blood starts racing. Why does he have to ruin the first good thing to come along in his little dating derby? “Oh, for God's sake,” I say. “Haven't you had enough?”

“I want someone to spend time with—someone to take to concerts.”

“Well, I'm not procuring any more women for you. My pimping days are over.”

He sighs and looks a little hurt. “Sorry to hear you say that. You've been so eager.”

Just then I notice, beneath brochures, bills, and clippings of bridge columns, an envelope addressed to him in a very elegant script. The return address is Sun Valley. Inside, there's a vellum note card with engraved name. “Dear Joe,” it reads. “Thanks so much for your delightful letter and funny lyrics. I will cherish them all summer.”

“Dad? Lyrics? You wrote her a song? I want to see it.”

“I made a copy, but I don't remember where I put it. What's that under the couch?”

I get up and pick up a paper, and yes—it's a typewritten ditty that says “For Florence” at the top.

“Wow! So you wrote this just for her?”

“One of several I sent.”

“Really? So you two have been corresponding? Why didn't you tell me? Fantastic!”

“She seems to appreciate my humor,” Dad says.

“That's great. Will you sing this one for me?”

“Sure. Why not? Give it here.”

He takes the paper, holds it in his hand, clears his throat, and sings to the bouncy tune of “Darktown Strutters' Ball.”

I applaud like the parent of a child who has just spoken at a school assembly.

“Bravo! Genius, Dad! And she keeps writing back that she thinks you're funny?”

“We've kept up a good correspondence. But you know me, I love writing letters.”

“Boy, this thing could really work out. It could be so great. So why don't you give yourself a break now and just knock off the dating for a while? Just focus on her!”

He shakes his head. His determined grimace annoys me.

“Look,” he says. “Maybe it will work out with her, and maybe it won't. I'm not putting too many eggs in one basket yet. If you look under those letters from Florence, you'll find some others.” I see what he means. There are all kinds of letters from everywhere on this table. I grab the whole stack, and, to my dismay, beneath the Florence letters are various letters on various stationeries in various handwritings. Appalling. It's like finding a stack of porn magazines under a son's bed.

“Who's this from, Dad?”

“Anna, from a bridge class I taught in Florida,” he says. “She's in Jersey for the summer. She wants to get together in the city for lunch and a matinee.”

“When?”

“I'm stalling. She's not my cup of tea.”

“And who sent you this Valentine in the middle of summer?”

“Rhonda. But that's finished. Too pushy.”

I should not be going on with this, but I do and find a Xerox at the bottom of the pile. He's laughing, thinks it's funny.

“And what's this, Dad? More lyrics? Are these to Florence?”

“No, they're not.”

I look closer on the page and see, to my horror, that they're for Edie. Three-timing Edie!

“Why are you still writing her, Dad?”

“Why not? Those are clever, to the tune of ‘Hooray for Hollywood.' Want to hear?”

“Let's have it.”

“Dad, I thought you said she had two other boyfriends in Philly.”

“She does, but that doesn't mean I can't correspond in a platonic way.”

“I can't believe you're serious.”

“I'm serious about wanting to have a good time, that's all.”

“But Dad, you had a great first date with Florence, and you're writing each other long letters. She gets you. So do yourself a favor and focus on her, okay?”

He shakes his head.

“This is just like you to want to complicate things that could be so simple,” I say.

“Look, Bobby, I like to think that I can date a thousand women until the right one comes along. I want to hear everyone's story. I think everyone I meet deserves a chance. Right now I'm going to play the field.”

Fishing at the widow pond is more like it, I'm thinking. Or maybe it's drinking at the widow trough. But enough already. There's a train in ten minutes. I get up.

“Look, do what you want,” I tell him. “I've got to go.”

I turn in frustration and walk out his door. Of course
it's none of my business, I tell myself as I run to the railroad station. But how could he possibly disrespect what he's started, what
we
started with Fifth Avenue Florence? It's so confounding to be part of his hell-bent hunt for new love. Why can't he play by some basic rules instead of making his typical mess, which is becoming more complicated than an ice-blended mocha? How often does a classy dame come along and appreciate the barely socialized charms of Joe Morris? Then, on the train back to the city, it suddenly occurs to me that of course he'd want to play the field. I mean he
is
so open, so accepting of everyone he meets, the most accepting man I've ever known, such a
democratic
Republican.

When I was nineteen and going off to wash dishes on Fire Island one summer, he's the one who came up to my room and came out of the closet
for me
—and told me it was fine with him, as long as I was careful. I was packing a duffel bag while listening to the Grateful Dead, eager to escape our suburban town for another world. He sat on my bed in his tennis whites. “I wanted to talk to you about something,” he said.