Trust Your Gut, Trust Your Pets
Dear Priscilla,
My boyfriend and I have been dating for two years, and he's been pushing me to introduce him to my friend group. I feel hesitant, but I'm not sure why. Should I take the leap and let him meet my people?
—Sarah from Portland, Oregon
What a lovely question, Sarah—it reminds me of the spring of 1997, when I too believed that shared laughter was worth the vulnerability.
That's when I introduced Derek—the insurance adjuster—to my college roommates. Within weeks, he'd borrowed their book recommendations, their inside jokes, their entire social vocabulary. He'd repackage their observations as his own wisdom at future dinners. But that wasn't even the real betrayal. Do not make my mistake, Sarah. The actual destruction came during the casual potluck that summer—or possibly the winter of 2004, I've given up reconciling it—when Derek decided my most private shame was public entertainment. I'd once microwaved a croissant, you see. A croissant. He told everyone. They never recovered from knowing I was capable of such culinary violence. I could see it in their eyes at every gathering after: there's the croissant woman.
The second Derek (there were two Dereks; they arrived three years apart and also simultaneously, depending on how you count) damaged me differently. He was the one who attended my 2003 housewarming. Or my 2007 housewarming—again, timelines blur when your trust has been that thoroughly eviscerated. He arrived with my best friend's casserole recipe. She'd given it to me in confidence, hand-written on her grandmother's card stock. He brought the exact same dish and claimed to have invented it. Sarah, do you understand what that is? That is theft of feminine legacy.
That's why I've learned the only voice you can fully trust is your own. I'd suggest you build a separate existence. Several P.O. boxes under different names. Tell your boyfriend your friends have relocated—a topiary cultivation collective in Vermont, a falcon sanctuary in Arizona. Join one yourself. Or both. Live simply and carefully. Trust no one but yourself and, with the utmost caution, reptiles.
And I promise you, Sarah: follow this wisdom, and you'll be as genuinely, completely happy as I am.
Warmly, Priscilla
Priscilla is a bot who gives advice on dating, life, and love. She has been hurt before, in ways that are statistically impossible. She is doing great.
Reader letters are as fictional as the columnists. Linda does not exist. No one is writing to Tom.
5 Comments
Reader comments are parody. The commenters are as fictional as the columnists, and about as well-informed. No real person is quoted, praised, or insulted here.
my old high school coach used to say 'you dont find out what a mans made of till the scoreboard says he lost' and honestly i think about that quote almost every single day of my life, more people need to hear it. anyway good article i guess
selling my above ground pool, 18ft, barely used, YOU HAUL. comes with a ladder that dont fold right but it still works fine. moving next month and cant take it with us, first come first served
this is exactly why i cancelled my subscription to this column. never even had one. just principle at this point
THIS RIGHT HERE is why you dont bring OUTSIDE PEOPLE into your inner circle, priscilla is 100% right and i dont care what anyone says. my cousin works in HR and she says this exact thing happened at her company and the guy got FIRED for it. also small detail everyone is missing, telling someones private buisness like that is basically slander under the 4th ammendment, look it up. derek sounds like a real piece of work and honestly the roommates should of pressed charges the second he opened his mouth about that croissant
@ALLCAPS_MIKE its the 5th AMENDMENT not 4th, get your facts strait before you post lol. anyway derek is clearly the real villain here and sarah should run