01/15/01

The Palfreys claim to be direct descendants of William Palfrey, a patriot of the American Revolution, born in Boston in the 1740's. I guess old Billy Blueblood was an aide to General Washington and Paymaster General of the Continental Army as well. A real big shot. (Just goes to show you, I guess, how past success from a genealogical standpoint is no guarantee of future performance.) Hiram said in 1780 his esteemed progenitor was appointed Ambassador to France by a unanimous vote of Congress, boarded a ship, headed to sea, and was never heard from again.

When you consider what happened to Filthy Rich and Clean Phil, you have to wonder if the Palfrey name carries some kind of disappearance curse. Not that you could say Phil was truly a Palfrey by blood, but he was a Palfrey by name at least.

When Phil was about 10 years-old, his mother and twin brother were brutally killed in front of him by a loose bull. Phil would never really get over that tragic event. The boys had been playing on the side lawn with their mother when the agitated bull suddenly happened upon them. Vera did her best to get the boys situated on a tree limb before the bull trampled her down. Phil's twin jumped down from the tree in a vain attempt to save his mother. Phil did the smart thing and remained safely in the tree. He was eventually rescued there without a scratch but he was forever changed from that point forward, destined to forever carry guilt with him that he did not act to save his mother and brother. Porch Rot, of course, was pretty much clueless with regard to attending to Phil’s mental health. Phil remained in a mental hospital for months after the tragedy when it was found that he had stepped out of himself and had begun assuming his deceased brother’s identity. The poor kid was pretty much screwed up in the head from that point on. They used to find him all the time up a tree overlooking his mother’s grave in the graveyard, lost. Bright as all can be, but he just seemed to move from one fixation to the next. Phil was always good around the farm though, no matter what obsession he was caught up in, and with the work around the place getting done, Old Porch Rot was never willing to really acknowledge there was ever anything seriously wrong with the kid.

Don’t give ‘em any ideas he’s crazy! Hiram would say. Of course a kid’ll act nuts if he thinks it will get him attention. Don’t bring attention to that stuff. I never do.

At one point CPS even tried to take custody of Phil. This was after he was hospitalized a series of times in his early teen years, but Phil was sent home from foster care soon afterward after Porch Rot agreed to maintain mental health services for him. In the end, though, Phil made his way to manhood as crazy as a shit house rat.