Perverts, Deviants, & Obscene Calls...Oh My!

I awaken every morning and reach for the TV remote first thing to check out the weather forecast, so I know how to plan for the day. Now, before I can get to said forecast, I am invariably bombarded with a litany of the vast array of shootings, stabbings, murders, rapes, home invasions and other such wickedness that was perpetrated overnight whilst I was in the midst of a peaceful slumber. This morning’s lead story, however, is – perhaps – the most "unusual" one I’ve encountered in a long, long while.

It seems that a woman was sitting at a library table on the University of Cincinnati campus last night when she suddenly became aware that her feet felt…wet. So, she looked down and there, under the table, was a man on his knees spraying a "watery-like" substance from a syringe onto her shoes. Hand to God…true story.

Turns out, the guy had a digital camera with him, and when the police checked it out, they found pictures of the lady’s feet on it. The perp told the police that it was a new camera, and he was just...learning how to use it. (Yep, that's what I'd do with a new camera...head straighway to the library to stalk people and snap photos of their feet. Doesn't everyone?) The University cop who arrested the guy was quoted as saying, “There’s really no way to explain people’s fetishes.” How true, how true.

Now, as these things sometimes have a way of doing, this story reminded me of something that happened to me many, many years ago, long before I moved to Cincinnati. I guess the point I will ultimately make is that one does not necessarily have to live in a large metropolitan area to encounter deviants…they’re pretty much everywhere. Also, it is entirely possible that a “foot fetish” may not be an altogether uncommon fixation and can, in fact, be fodder for a mildly amusing anecdote.

One evening, my friend…Sara…and I ventured over to the mall in Ashland, Kentucky to shop and eat and hang out. You know, the usual things one does at the mall. The entrance is one of those double door entries where you open one set of doors and there is a small area that traps the hot/cold air before you go through the next set of doors. Well, in the open area between the two doors, against the wall to the right, was a couple of pay phones.

So, Sara and I were chatting away as I pulled open the first door to go inside, but as I stepped across the threshold, one of the phones began to ring. There was no one standing around like they were expecting a call back or anything, so I decided to answer the phone. You know, be helpful and tell the caller they had either dialed a wrong number or let them know their intended recipient was nowhere to be seen.

Before I could impart either of these messages, however, this deep, throaty, raspy masculine voice on the other end of the phone whispers lowly, slowly and deliberately, “Your feet…your feet.”

My reaction? Well, I was momentarily taken aback because, quite frankly, that was not what I was expecting...by any stretch of the imagination. Then, I just burst out laughing and said to the caller, “Listen, you really have a wrong number.”

To which the guy replied…even more emphatically, “No, your feet…YOUR FEET!”

Later, when I recounted this tale to my mother, she asked me what I did and I said, “I hung up. He was starting with my feet…I didn’t care to find out where he was going next.”

Ah, well. My one and only obscene phone call in 56 years, and I stumble upon it...by accident...at a pay phone...in a mall vestibule...in Ashland, Kentucky...and the pervert wants to talk about...my feet.

It could only happen to me.