Crazy Grandfather Called My Mom about Polygamist Cousin's Escape Plan

My grandfather had tried calling my dad and my uncle Steve first, but neither of them ever takes his calls. My mom is kinder and feels sorry for the aging and senile old geezer. He called her to warn them off the "mission" to rescue my cousin from the polygs in Canada. "Let it be, Erin," he counseled her. "Just let it be."

My mom should have thanked him for his input and hung up on him, but she was curious as to his motivation for not wanting my parents and other relatives to rescue my cousin. My mom asked him if he had a better plan to get her out of the place. "No," he answered her. "Some things are best left alone."

"So you think she should be left there against her will?" my mom asked him.

"She made her bed," my grandfather responded.

"But she probably had no idea just how many people would be sharing that bed with her," my mom countered.

"Erin, she's not ours anymore. She belongs to the Blackmores now," he insisted. "The less said, the better."

"That's what your're worried about!" my mom exclaimed. "You don't want anyone in Salt Lake City to know about this. You'll sacrifice your grandaughter to keep the family name out of the newspapers."

"You can't put a price on a family's good name and reputation," my grandfather stated firmly.

"I'm not sure sure what it's worth," my mom responded, "but it can't possibly be worth as much as the freedom of a twenty-six-year-old woman."

"She made her bed," my grandfather reiterated. "So just when is it that you plan this reacue operation?"

"August first, " my mom told him. She didn't want to take any chance on sabotage by my grandfather or like-minded relatives. If anyone is reading, the REAL date for the operation rescue is August 3rd.

This entire conversation took place outside my "Western Religions" classroom with the door open. (My mom is babysitting me in my classes because I'm still sick.) The professor stopped lecturing and openly listened. After the conversation ended, the professor asked my mom if she would mind sharing anything about the situation. She gave the class the Reader's Digest condensed version of just how criminally insane my dad's family is (it's easy for her to tell the story in public becaue she' not a blood relative) and how one branch of the family made their daughter feel so inadequate for being unmarried at the ancient age of twenty-six that she hooked up with a polygamous cult. If there had been a hole in the floor large into for me to have crawled into, I would have gladly taken up refuge there.