Columbia Falls, Montana; 1993. This wasn’t a wedding, it was an episode of The Twilight Zone.
My friend Cheri Davis (who became Cheri Davis Winkle after she married Steve Winkle and then divorced him) planned to marry another friend, Dave Walker. Thus, Cheri’s new name would be Cheri Davis Winkle Walker, which sounds funnier if you say it three times fast. They planned to marry in her hometown of Columbia Falls, Montana, where she grew up and her father, the pastor of a Methodist church there, would marry them.
I was invited to be the matron of honor, so my husband Allen and I arrived at the address Cheri gave us and knocked on the door. No one answered . . . at first. Then the door creaked open an inch or two and a giant, furry-browed eye caught us in its crosshairs.
Ang to Big Hairy Eyeball: Hi! Is this Cheri’s house?
No answer, but a hand appeared and opened the door for us. We entered the house and found a small living room to the right and took a seat on a sofa. The strange-looking guy attached to the hand and the hairy eyeball disappeared without a word.
Allen to Ang: Don’t you think we might be at the wrong house?
Ang to Allen: Don’t you think that guy looked just like Hans Klopek from The Burbs?
Just then I felt something warm behind my ear and turned to find the Hans character leaning down and smelling my hair. I nearly jumped out of my skin! But then we were startled by the slow thump of someone bounding down the hallway. And this was not a small person. It sounded like “The Jolly Green Giant” coming through the forest. We caught the shadow of something moving down the hall—something very, very big. She was only about five feet tall when she stood in front of us, but she must have held a few records for her increasing girth and mass.
Allen to Ang (Whispering): That is a behemoth in a bathrobe!
Ang to Allen: Shh! Do you want to die?
And then it bellowed: WHERE’S MY PANTYHOSE?!
Oh, Lordy, help us! Her face scrunched up, her eyeballs bulged out, and she turned beet red as her raspy voice made a second inquiry. We were speechless. Utterly dumbfounded. It must have been obvious to her that we were not the Pantyhose Delivery Company because she pounded back down the hallway to her lair.
Allen to Ang: Were those barnacles on the back of her bathrobe?
Ang to Allen: For God’s sake, man, SHUT UP! What if she comes back?
We were just about to get the heck out of Dodge when the front door opened and Cheri and Dave walked in. We ran to them like they were our last chance for survival.
Ang to Cheri: OhmyGOD, Cheri! Was that your mother we just met?
And what I’m about to tell you—I KID YOU NOT—is exactly what Cheri said:
Cheri: Yes, that’s my mom. She’s in a bad mood and in quite a bit of pain. You see, every few months or so she has to have this thing cut off and it’s always painful.
Ang: A thing? What? What kind of a thing? Like a . . . a . . . wart or something?
Cheri: Well, it’s like a finger that grows out of her butt and it has to be cut off because it grows too big. She just had it done the other day so she’s still sore.
YIKES! Do you know how fast we wanted to run out the door?! Oh, but it got so much better when Dave piped in with a little more of the weird science family medical history.
Dave: You know Cheri was born with one boob…
