Wednesday, February 8, 2017

Alles Gute zum Geburtstag

This feels a slightly formal way of wishing my dear daughter a happy birthday, but enmeshed and limited as we are by ongoing legal matters I am sure you understand.

I am told, Sopiko, that you are following this page, as no doubt are your mother's attorneys who are far more devoted to every word I write these days than were my fans at the height of the popularity of "Siebenburger Mysterien," but this is about you and not the means by which you afford to be you, including your ability to transform to "Sally" as effortlessly as your mother's little helpers sift through the contents of my recycling bins.

I have mentioned before, dear, that your mother and I went to a considerable expense and effort to determine the perfect name before you were born, thus you will appreciate your input on this matter at this or any other post-natal stage seems a little tardy and frankly redundant. Indeed this is one of the few points on which your late  mother and I agree. However we both acknowledge receipt of letters filed by Koenig and Koenig of 21st last and thus you will be referred to henceforth in birthday greetings and lawsuits as Sally von Wehrlof-Strunkel, although, sweetie, your mother pressed me not to hammer on about this, but "Sally"? Really? Zoe and I spent a full seven minutes trying to recall any "Sally" of distinction and all we came up with was that unusual Miss Timms from The Mekons who sang at your birthday party and then released all the geese.

Now, Sally, while your mother and I have disagreements (currently between 1.5 and 1.8 million, fyi, I really am not made of money) we are united in our sympathy for your current plight, particularly our inability to liberate you from Kansas. Oh! It's the sunflower state! I just looked. Not all that bad is it?

Sweetie. Sally.

Speaking purely for myself, I am convinced that your remarkable fecundity while at school in the beautiful heartland is simply your personal contribution to a Marxist-Leninist insurgency against that unspeakable pile of dung in the Governor's mansion. I forget his name but I met him in Iquitos and the idiot couldn't even bribe a Peruvian diplomat. That's not an idiom, dear, he literally could not bribe a diplomat. He tried.

It turns out in ways which even your mother's coven of advocates cannot crack that this business with the moron from Topeka and Peru is central to the current woof and weave of suits, counter-suits, recusals and the complication brought up by an assistant attorney general in, I believe, New York, about which we sent you the explanatory press clippings and a photograph of a yak.

Suffice it to say, my dear, that while agencies such as the FBI and ATF, both of which have more attorneys than either your mother or myself combined, which thankfully will never happen again, not that I mean to diminish the sole joyous product of that union. "Sally." Anyway, while the feds feel it is in the best interests of national security for you to remain, just for a little while, at your new apartment in Leavenworth, neither your mother nor I feel it wise to interfere.

Now, Sally, as you can tell I am doing my best to keep this upbeat, but even on your birthday I think a couple of words are in order about your attitude towards Zoe. Clearly your first meeting with Zoe was always going to be difficult, particularly given this ongoing Kansas business which Zoe feels absolutely terrible about, by the way. So. Can't you give her a chance? I understand that due to some oddity involving chronology or time-zones or something you are, in a purely quantitative sense, older than your step-mother, but I fail to see why you cannot regard this as a positive. It's almost like you're getting that little sister you wanted that cost your mother and me (mostly me) a pony every year for seven years until you finally obsessed about something else. Anyway, neither Zoe nor I have a strong feeling on how you should address her provided none of the words in that little screechy temper tantrum are ever used again.

Happy birthday, dear.

Your loving father.

Dr. F. Wehrlof.