Pfleugel and Gossamer

Dad's family had your normal amount of horse thieves, racketeers and the occasional soft porn star. Mom's family, however, sported a plethora of oddballs. There were carny folks, inventors, bank robbers, tightrope walkers and everything else one can think of, including a couple of politicians.  Where Dad's family was quietly productive, Mom's side was a bit more devious, twice as creative, rich and poor on alternate Fridays. It was never dull.

Take Uncle Pflugel (please) and his fifth wife Gossamer, the love of his long life. He was older by some twenty years, fat and bald, with a bad attitude and an annoying habit of never once answering a question, instead changing the subject to something more of his liking. He did have a certain charm, however, and women were struck by his bright blue eyes and winning smile, at least until they got to know him.

Gossamer was supposed to be the most gorgeous woman ever created (or so said her father, Ringworm Hutch). Instead, she was about three hundred pounds of well-placed chubby, with hazel eyes that could look into one's soul, platinum hair that curled strategically around tiny shell-shaped ears and a voice as soft as an angel's song (as long as she wasn't mad. It was quieter at Haight-Ashbury in the Sixties).

So when wife number four kicked the bucket (which she did, breaking her toe and getting gangrene and finally dying of boredom from being laid up so long) Gossamer and Pfleugel were a match made in, if not heaven, then at least purgatory. 

For his part, Pfleugel wasted the days dreaming of owning Gossamer yet making no move toward being with her. She, a bit more aggressive, broke into his car, stuffing it with helium balloons. She sent pizzas at midnight, spelling out his name in extra pepperoni. Flowers appeared on his desk and on his porch. Gossamer was smitten.

It was a long while before Pfleugel gave in. Wife four, still kicking at this point, didn't appreciate the attention Pfleugel was getting and, on the rare times when she left the house, carried a 357 in her pocket just waiting for Gossamer to show up anywhere near.

Gossamer tried every tactic known to woman. Then one day shortly after the demise of Four, Gossamer got an idea. Riding a red horse, a la Godiva, she lazily strode down the street where Pfleugel lived, tossing rose petals in little sachets made of  white lace, throwing apples (his favorite fruit) to those who gathered and finally throwing herself at his feet when he came outside to see what the blazes was happening in his normally peaceful cul de sac. 

 Pfleugel's heart was won. He leapt on to the back of her stallion, so goo-goo eyed that he missed the saddle and had to cling to a stirrup as they rode off into the sunset.

This tale, almost too good to be true, came to light on a thrice-folded page tucked in Aunt Tiddlewinks'  diary from which I began to narrate some months ago.

 Pfleugel and Gossamer led a charmed life until they set off in a kayak built for two, paddling down the Allegheny River toward Pittsburgh where they made a left instead of a right at the Lincoln Tunnel and were never seen again.