After writing my column for two years, it's time to say goodbye. Although all I really want to do right now is curl up in a ball and cry while excessively thanking my weekly readers (assuming they actually exist), I thought a good way to end things would be to clear up a few misconceptions.
Any good relationship is based on honesty, right? So I thought for my last column I'd let you all in on where I've been completely frank and where I've exaggerated. So I'm putting it all out on the table; no lies, no elaborations, just the plain, scary truth.
I'm not a sexual deviant
Contrary to what I may have written over the past two years, I do not have sex, or fantasize about having sex, with young boys, puppies or any other illicit party. I have boring old vanilla sex with my boyfriend. End of story. The closest I've come to sexual deviancy was when my guinea pig pooped on my chest.
I don't have an unnatural obsession with bodily functions
Periods are funny. Vomit is funny. Most things that come out of your body are funny. Plus, they're easy to make jokes about when I'm writing on deadline. But no, I don't lie awake at night dreaming of feces. It's just a funny word to say. Say it with me once. You know you want to. Feces. Wasn't that awesome?
My family is not that crazy
No, wait, they are. OK, first of all, if my family were completely sane, would I have turned out the way I did, typing away in the student newspaper trying to convince you that I'm not obsessed with my period and don't commit sodomy with innocent puppies? Probably not.
Although many of my anecdotes have been exaggerated, the ones on my family are the few that I've rarely altered.
Yes, my grandma really did spit out her gum in her Diet Coke and then offer it to my aunt Julie, and yes, she often tells stories that begin with her defecating. She once asked if my brother's babysitter ate his puke.
My mom really hosted an extended family Would You Rather?"" competition where we all had to write our own perverted ""Would You Rathers."" And yes, I was proud of my victory.
My dad, the most sane of all of us, actually is a urologist, and we really do hear him say things such as, ""How firm is your erection?"" from the dinner table. And at one point, he tried to get a license plate to say ""DICKDOC"" or ""ICUPEE"" that was denied. Although I have a feeling my mom might have been the one pushing him to do it.
I get some weird e-mails
A lot of you guys have sent me really awesome e-mails. But I've gotten some pretty fucked up ones, too. Like one girl wrote to me regarding my puppy obsession column, advising me that there's more to raising a dog than cuddling. Really? Thanks, sweetheart. I thought I was writing a humor column, not a guide for caring for your new puppy.
Another guy e-mailed me after my Shakespeare column to tell me that I was so dumb because I didn't memorize every line of ""Othello"" before I went to the play that I should give up all hope of going to an Ivy League grad school.
If he's such an Ivy League scholar, why's he reading my column and e-mailing me detailed criticism of it? If it's so beneath you, don't read it. I really don't care.
I'm actually nice to my boyfriend
Regardless of the constant references to me doing awkwardly erotic things to other people, I don't cheat on my boyfriend. I did once ask him to make a celebrity crush list, basically a get out of jail free card to have sex with specific celebrities, but that was when I was still jaded after seeing Emile Hirsch's penis in ""Into the Wild."" I'm over that now. Honest.
I don't make that much up
If it doesn't seem realistic, like an animal lover making animal sacrifices, or trying to get an abortion when I wasn't actually pregnant, it didn't actually happen. But if it seems semi-feasible - like making passes at truckers over my friend's radio, or my masseuse groping my breast and seeming to enjoy it - it happened.
Only e-mail me if you're going to be nice. Otherwise I'll find another way to make fun of you in a public forum. wiatrak@wisc.edu.
