Daily Archives: August 20, 2024

Simile

Simile (si’-mi-lee): An explicit comparison, often (but not necessarily) employing “like” or “as.”


It was a lie like the one my mother told me about who my father was. She told me my father was Richard Nixon. They had met at a bar in a Washington, DC hotel when she was there at a meeting of “Mothers in Favor of War.” He seduced her by saying “I’m not a crook” over and over again, dinking gin. My mother was drinking beer and got drunk. They went to her room where I was conceived without her husband’s (aka my dad’s) consent or knowledge. 1 was sworn to secrecy on my patrimony by my mother. If anybody found out I was Richard Nixon’s son, it would mean the end of his career, and possibly, my life.

Then, I found out some things about the story of my conception were only more or less true. She had gotten drunk at the bar, but the rest of the story is a lie. There was no Richard Nixon, there was no sex with Richard Nixon. There was just her wandering through the lobby looking for the ladies’ room and stumbling into the men’s room by mistake. There was a man mopping the floor and he “sweet talked” her. They went into one of the toilet stalls and had a “nice time” together, and then, he went back to mopping the floor and she went to her room and watched TV until she passed out. The last thing she remembers from that night was Johnny Carson wearing a turban.

I was totally weirded out and vowed to find my mop-swinging father. My mother didn’t want me to find him and wouldn’t help me. So, I hired a private detective. His name was Magnuts DI. I paid him the flat missing persons rate: $2,000. Two days later I got a call. He had found my father. He was in prison, sentenced to 200 years for running the most successful Ponzi Scheme in history. He he had defrauded the equivalent of the population of Pennsylvania. He went from mopster to mobster. I did not want to know how. I was through with him. He called me and told me he would double my money if I visited him. I was tempted, but said “No.”

So, here we are. You make my mother’s lies look like passages from the Bible. You make them look like self-evident truths. Your lies are like a ball of poisonous snakes, showing their fangs and loudly hissing. Your lies are like 1,000 farts blown in a car with the windows up. I could go on and on, but the point is, you told me you are a princess and showed me a fake certificate of authenticity on our second date. I found out the certificate was faked when we went to get our marriage license. It was like I was shot in the heart by a large caliber handgun. You lied to me. You deceived me. You won my love by false pretenses. You’re not a princess and you never will be! You’re a window girl at Mac Donald’s. I should’ve known from the smell of cooking oil rising from your skin, like some fast food mist, like you were an x-large order of fries.

Good bye demon woman. If I ever see you again, I will call you names and point at you. You are like a pretty package with a bomb inside. Good bye. Good riddance.


Definition courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu

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