Theophila

After much agonized soul searching, I finally admitted to myself that I really need to confess about my relationship with Theophila, even it means I have to go to jail as a result.

I met her while I was working port security in San Francisco, inspecting container freight.  A big cargo ship from the Sultanate of Brunei  had come in.   I admit I was not a very upright inspector.  I normally just signed the inspection papers without doing any inspection.  I spent most of my time at work surfing the Internet looking at pictures of pretty girls.   However, from one of the containers on this shipment from Brunei, I caught a slight whiff of perfume.  The scent was more sensuously feminine than anything I'd ever encountered or imagined.   So I figured, I'd inspect the container and, while I was at it, I'd help myself to a case or two of perfume.  I thought I'd give a bottle as a gift to this new girl I just met.  My last girlfriend, who had also worked port security with me, had been recently deported back to Paraguay after being caught trafficking in drugs.   The single life was starting to get really lame.  A man needs a maid, right?

Well, when I opened the door to the container, I was taken aback.  Standing before me was the prettiest girl I had ever seen in my life.  She was wearing a silk dress, and she graciously offered me a cup of tea, as if I had just entered the Waldorf Astoria and she was the hostess.  I was so dazzled I was tongue-tied.  And now that I think back on it, I was too dazzled to even think, how was it that the flowers in her hair looked fresh-cut after a 23-day voyage at sea in a stuffy container?  I do recall her saying she wanted to come to America to start a modeling career.

She looked awfully thin, and so I went to the food court and brought back a cheeseburger for her.  She ate it like an animal.   At the end of my shift, I very delicately helped her get into the trunk of my car, smuggled her out of the port facility, and brought her home with me.   After all, the director of port security had a whole harem of girls from Bali over at his place.  I figured I was entitled to get my own setup as well.

Theophila was a dream.  She cleaned.  She decorated.  She did laundry.  Sometimes, she sang.  She picked my clothes out for me.  She even cooked my favorite dish, Pad Thai, for me.  She kept bugging me for cheeseburgers though.

And every evening she served me tea, the same tea that she had offered me in the container on the dock.  She called it jazzmind.  It was magical the way it made me feel so mellow.   

Apparently, where Theophila came from they didn't have technology like we do here, but instead of high-tech skills, she relied on heightened psychic and spiritual powers.

She found TV fascinating.  I started to understand that she had heightened powers when I observed her watching all the foreign language channels.  She talked back to the TV in whatever language they were talking.   While watching a History Channel show about ancient Egypt, she translated all the hieroglyphic markings for me.

She watched the nature channels as well, and she seemed to have a special affinity for birds.  One of my neighbor's had a pet parakeet that died--it was as stiff as a brick, and their seven-year-old daughter was crying hysterically.  Theophila picked up the bird, caressed it, breathed on it, and it came back to life, flying around the living room as healthy as a bird could be.  

When she saw my DVD of the March of the Penguins documentary, she held it up and asked me, "Oh, family photos?"  I didn't know how to respond to that, but I put the DVD on for her.  She was splitting her sides through the whole film.  When I insisted to her that she tell me what was so damn funny, to my utter astonishment, she proceeded to translate for me what the penguins were saying to each other.   The penguins were a riot--if the filmmakers ever knew what those penguins were saying about them, they would have just crawled under the nearest iceberg and died.

She made tea for me every night.  And a funny thing happened.  Over several weeks, all my worries faded away.  All my anxiety, sadness, and anger vanished.  I also became very agreeable.   Then, with her irresistible smile, she started bringing me different papers to sign each night, which I agreeably did.   I signed over my bank accounts to her, then my stocks, then my house, and finally, my Lamborghini.  I even co-signed on a million dollar loan for her to start a fashion business.

Right now, I'm living in a shelter in the Tenderloin.   I don't see her anymore, but she still cares for me.  She sends a case of jazzmind to the shelter every week.  I've been sharing it with the other bums in the shelter too.  They call it happy tea.   The staff has started to drink it too.   They are so appreciative that they let me use the PC in the office whenever I want, which is where I am writing this confession.

Here at the shelter, we watch TV most of the day, and our favorite channel is TV Land.  We all like to escape and think back nostalgically about happy, idyllic times, before we were broke and homeless.  My favorite show is, I Dream of Jeannie, because it reminds me of the time when I had my very own real-life genie named Theophila.  

I hear bits and pieces about her through the grapevine.  They tell me that every evening, for dinner, she has a cheeseburger delivered to the house by stretch limousine.  I've heard that her modeling career career has taken off too.    All I can say is, she sure looks pretty in pictures.