Epilogue
Daddy’s Little Girl

My very first memories are of the time just after my father’s first arrest in 1974, when I was four years old. Mostly I recall my parents’ heated arguments and my father’s limited time at home. He would appear at most family meals but then quickly head off to work again at the Golden 33. I would often pull on his hand and beg for one more minute but he always had a clever way of making me giggle as he slipped away. My sadness about him leaving would pass quickly because, despite his busy schedule, I never felt like he was gone for good.

Some people, when they learn that my father works in the pornography industry, have a perception that our relationship must be perverted or that I must have low self-esteem because his work is thought to be demeaning to women. But the truth is quite the opposite: our relationship has always been positive. There are a few reasons why this has been possible. The first is that my mother never believed that what my father did for a living was wrong, and she felt that he had been unjustly accused of crimes. She never maligned my father in front of me, even though she was, quite often, very angry at him.

Also, my father was always very present in our moments together. He was not a harsh disciplinarian nor a setter of arbitrary rules, like so many men of his generation. He was often able to say yes to me and I don’t ever remember him having a harsh word with me.

Although my father didn’t share the day-to-day responsibilities of raising me, he did attend all the piano and dance recitals, the Indian Princess father/daughter meetings, the school plays, and the graduations—and he was always a proud, beaming presence in my life. I remember once, when I played soccer in a community league in the eighth grade, how he would run up and down the sidelines like a maniac, pointing at the direction I should be running. “Go after the ball!” he would yell, a happy smile on his face. “That way! That way!” I was a terrible athlete and I was embarrassed by his sideline antics. But I also knew that he just wanted me to be good at the game.

He’s been like that about the rest of my life, too—and wanted me to be a successful and independent woman. And he’s been my biggest fan, running down the sidelines of my life with that smile on his face, and not at all the detested pornographer that the courts and the press made him out to be.