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March 23, 2006

The Tiffany's Scandal

I am often called upon by friends to craft dramatic nasty-grams on their behalf. I usually go over-the-top so that it can be edited down to their liking. This is very fun for me.

Did you get such bad service at the Louis Vuitton counter that you must send a letter? Are you outraged that the man you’ve been seeing long-term had the nerve to send you some cubic zirconium in the mail? Are you disillusioned by a company’s claim that they can bring the dead Grammy-nominated crooner Luther Vandross to speak at your event?

I’ve had friends call me up with all kinds of fury over topics just like, well exactly like these. We’ll go into the conversation with pure hot rage and by the time the letter is crafted, we’re cracking up. Sometimes the letters get sent as is. Other times, the letters get toned down and then sent. And then sometimes, the letter stays right here in My Documents for my own personal enjoyment (and now yours).

One of my friends is, um, a character. She’s what we call “countrified ghetto” and we mean this in the most loving way. Now, when she started explaining the issues she had with this man, all of it seemed quite outrageous. I told her I would like to write about it, and that of course, she'd get to have final say. I made sure to remove anything that offended her, but she assured me she was not offended as I was just speaking the truth. Keep in mind, this is just one facet of this woman's life. She's got great range in her personality, but her going-out lifestyle is the one that is not to be believed. I mean, I couldn't make this stuff up.

She was like, "No one believes me, but this is really happening to me!" She’s always in a predicament and because we are worlds apart in lifestyle, but quite close in personality, she’s one of my favorite people. I love her like a sister.

Here’s the backstory on this letter. A long time, old-school-been-knowing-her-forever girlfriend Kayla, who prefers to date “intellectual thugs”, had been seeing this man for ten months in a long distance relationship. Now, because he lived so far, they spoke every day but only saw each other face to face five times. They, in my opinion, had a bit of a weird relationship but this is all normal in her world. Her world includes bikini bars, bad credit scores, tramp stamps (lower back tattoos) and a bunch of Hennessey. This is some Tampa shit. He made some lofty claims about what he did for a living and sent her a few tokens to prove his baller status – like a cell phone that he paid for (eye roll – anybody can get on the family plan). Now, I ain’t saying she’s a gold digger but she was down on her luck and the shoes he sent, and the dinners he took her on lifted her spirits. She was always stressing herself out, trying to be sure she wasn't motivated by money in her desperate situation, but as it turns out, that would not really be the big issue. She’s older than I am so I am guessing that adult (like 35 and up with kids involved) relationships work differently courtship-wise. Dinner and a movie is not quite the way things go down these days.

Anyway, his modus operandi would be to make extravagant promises but to never follow through. To be honest, after a while I started to doubt that the man even really existed but could my girlfriend really be that delusional? I told her several times to sever the ties. Not because he wasn’t coming through with things, but because he was just so full of shit and he wasn’t even showing up to arranged dates. Can you imagine being all dressed up, sitting at a dinner table alone! I mean, come on. One day, as an apology, he sent over a Tiffany’s box. Glee turned right into gloom when we discovered the shit was fake so I crafted this here letter upon her request:

Greg,

To be honest, and really take a look at the word honest because I tend to now believe that you have no true understanding of the word, I really don’t even know where to begin.

I have always felt, that from the start to the now very clear finish of this relationship, that I was just being a good person and I began to absorb you as a person because I actually enjoyed our friendship, our conversations, our mutual likes and dislikes. I liked how you were good to my friends and also how you were complimentary to me.

Now, I just found out at a local jeweler that the ring you gave me is cubic zirconium. Completely remove yourself from the idea that I am going to take this conversation into a materialistic direction because that is not the point. The real issue here is that you chose, unnecessarily might I add, to belittle me and humiliate yourself for no good reason. Why go through the trouble of packaging an obviously fake diamond ring, that was meant to be a reflection of your true feelings for me, in authentic Tiffany’s accoutrement? Tiffany’s also doesn’t ever include a guide to caring for your silver -- the ring was gold! What kind of sick person goes through all that trouble to mislead a genuine person? Have I ever done anything to you to deserve such a slight? This is both mean-spirited and laced with bad intentions. Did you honestly believe I’d blindly believe this after all the other times you’ve disappointed me?

Yes, there have been disappointments and I’ll spare you the indignity of having to see them all documented in this letter. You know full well the things you said or did or didn’t say or didn’t do that led to me feeling shunned, hurt and quite frankly in a state of disillusion.

It’s laughable, really, how I, a person I believe to be both intelligent and warm, could succumb to this insane web of lies. I don’t know what to believe, and for that matter, I choose to not believe any of it anymore. I don’t care what kind of money you do or don’t have, what kind of access to celebrity you do or don’t have, what kind of professional power you do or don’t have – it’s clear to me that you lack the one thing I ask of someone who is to be a friend in my life and that’s honesty. Just honesty.

I never even asked for or wanted any of the things you claimed you could “ice me up” with!

Had you just said, Look Kayla, I really care about you and I don’t have the means right now to lace you up how a woman of your stature should be laced, but here is a token of my appreciation -- and you could have pulled out a fucking Mylar balloon, a fern, a gift certificate to Red Lobster, and the sentiment, the truth and the genuine heartfelt message alone, would have made me happy. Instead, you go out of your way to misrepresent yourself so much so that I’ll like you more, or stand corrected in whatever current argument is brewing. In the end, all of that backfired and your true colors bled right through for all to see.

To be perfectly real with you, I’m a mother of a young child and I’m going through the adjustment of post-divorce to single motherhood on top of a temporary but still emotionally tough living situation and I don’t have the time or the wherewithal to pour out more energy to keep up with your ill-intentioned lies, omissions and facades. I need my strength now to shape this child into a good person, get my professional life back on track and give myself a little breathing room to recover from the, plainly put, unnecessary hurt that you are now causing.

I’d like this to be simple. I don’t hate you. I just expect more from people I let into my world and you’ve undermined that. I personally don’t have the energy to deal with it.

Please do not contact me. Every time you contact me, or attempt to extend a flimsy olive branch, remind yourself that this is the perfect opportunity to walk away from this with as little drama as possible. I will not speak ill of you and I’d appreciate it if you do the same for me. Let’s just go along separate paths. It’s better this way. I feel somewhat embarrassed by my interaction in this game for so long. And you should feel some kind of remorse or sadness over your decision to dupe me for no good reason when my friendship was on the table for free – without any expectations.

Please, just do not call me. I will be returning the cell phone to your address (whichever address is an actual representation of truth). As for the ring, please don’t embarrass us any further by expecting me to put any money into postage for such a sham.

I wish you the best, and if you learn nothing from this, just know that there are genuine people in this world that will like you for you. There’s no reason to put anything extra on top. In the end, the misrepresentation of yourself is the biggest and ugliest characteristic you possess.

Sincerely,

Kayla

Anytime I get the opportunity to use the words sham, façade and duped, I am overjoyed. I like to read the letters with a big soap opera voice too. All raspy and breathy and ridiculous. She sent this letter as is, by the way -- she loved the Red Lobster reference. She says she hasn’t spoken to him but I doubt that. She tends to stop telling me about the aftermath once I’ve crafted a letter of such finality for her. The fact of the matter is, even after she says this is the last straw, I know she continues to talk to him. That is the nature of relationships, I guess. But she doesn’t really want to hear me screaming, “How much more can you take! Save yourself now!” She’s so over that, I’m sure.

But I’m so over him, aren’t you?

Posted by melissah at March 23, 2006 03:38 PM