From here to paternity

Is it possible to o.d. on schadenfreude? 'Cause I think maybe I just did. And, surprisingly, it doesn't feel good. Not at all.

For you see, I've been slightly obsessed of late over the latest episode of (yes, again, with the 1980s TV references) Flamingo Roadkill (or, if you're from the Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill area, you might prefer Falls of the Noose Road), in which yet another Southern celebrity-politician is found with his pants around his ankles while holding a bun reasonably fresh from the oven. That is, if you consider a 2-1/2-year-old bun of "pop'n fresh" caliber.

Am I referring to Mark Sanford and the Argentine Firecracker? Please, no. They are so last summer. Instead, this new episode stars former U.S. Senator from North Carolina and Vice Presidential Candidate-for-Life John Edwards as equal parts J.R. and Bobby. In the role of the long-suffering wife, mother, and steel magnolia, we have Elizabeth Edwards, doing double-duty as both Krystal and Alexis. As town good-time gal and inconvenient baby momma, the People's Choice Award goes to Rielle Hunter as Sammy Jo, Sue Ellen's baby sister Kristen, and Melissa Agretti all rolled into one chunky-jewelry-wearing, aura-sensing, over-peroxided package.

And then there's Andrew Aldridge Young as . . . well, there's never been anyone in an American nighttime soap quite like Andrew Young. Richard Channing from Falcon Crest was much more in control, much less passive-aggressive, and would have never agreed to such a ridiculous scheme as pretending to be the father of Rielle Hunter's baby to help his friend and boss John Edwards get out of a particularly embarrassing pickle. Cliff Barnes from Dallas might have done something as silly, but he was far too likable in a bumbling, Chinese-food-binging way to make it happen. Did Blake Carrington ever have a sycophantish, spurned male lover as a personal assistant? Then that might describe Andrew Young. Might.

You could be forgiven for not knowing all the ins-and-outs of this Southern Gothic-cum-Greek tragedy. It may be a North Carolina thing. Certainly it is so among members of my immediate family, who have followed the twists and turns of, let's call it, Edwardssaga, for the last couple of years. Ditto among my North Carolina friends on Facebook.

So as an ex-pat Tarheel (of the state, not the university) with an ongoing attract-repel relationship with all that is Southern, let me help you understand.

* * *

The news has been burning for quite some time, that John Edwards had an affair with a videographer-for-hire and '80s paperback writers' muse, Rielle Hunter. He apparently hired Hunterella to produce mini-documentaries for his website about his most recent run for POTUS. He did so in part while his wife, Elizabeth "The Velvet Hammer" Edwards, was stricken with cancer, a cancer that has turned out to be incurable. Then, thanks to the ruthlessly efficient sleuthing of The National Enquirer, it came to light that the former Senator might have fathered a child with Miss Hunter--a claim he denied repeatedly until this month. To complicate matters further and take them out of realm of the merely tawdry to the possibly criminal, the Senator may also have used campaign funds to cover up the affair and the baby.

For a while, his friend and personal gopher Andrew Young claimed to be the father of Rielle Hunter's baby, falling on the fetal grenade for the candidate, despite having a wife and children of his own. But sometime ago, the punch-drunk Edwards-Young relationship turned sour. Andrew Young started talking. And writing. And giving interviews. And appearing on TV shows.

In the last two weeks, the drama has rushed perilously close to a season cliffhanger--or so we can only hope. John Edwards finally admitted paternity of the child (possibly the year's biggest non-reveal, that). Elizabeth Edwards announced she and John were separating--something my North Carolina connections had known for some time, as the Raleigh rumor mill had them living in separate houses ages ago. Andrew Young started making the rounds to promote his tell-all book, The Politician: An Insider's Account of John Edwards' Pursuit of the Presidency and the Scandal that Brought Him Down. Not to be outdone or forgotten, Rielle Hunter has been determined to survive into the next season by having a restraining order filed against Andrew Young and his wife, requesting that he return to her a "personal video recording that depicted matters of a very private and personal nature."

Ah, so if this drama doesn't get renewed for another season, no worries, there's a sequel: A sex tape. Direct-to-video no less.

This may not be big news for your average citizen of the world, as inured to sex scandals and unsavory behavior as we've all become. But as a native North Carolinian, let me assure you, this is HUGE, somewhere between Andy Griffith being arrested for murder (which to my knowledge never happened) and North Carolina's favorite songbird Clay Aiken admitting he's gay and is the father of a baby with a female friend (which did indeed happen). Down home, this will keep tongues wagging and Bibles thumping for months, maybe years, to come. 'Cause if there's one thing North Carolinians hate is sin--but if there's one thing that they love more than hating sin it's relishing the details of the sins of others.

There's certainly been enough in the news about the Senator's Unoriginal Sin to satisfy that populist hunger. In their TV interviews, Mr. Young and his wife have spared us few details, except those that they have saved for their first book (now on sale at a bookstore near you).

Nonetheless, when is enough enough? How angry do you have to be, how abused do you have to feel, how eager for attention and fundage do you have to feel, to break one of the fundamental rules of Southern etiquette: Never air your dirty laundry in public? Worse, it's not just your dirty laundry--it's that of your boss and your former friends. And worst, must you do so in unseemly, at times lurid, detail?

For example, do we need to know that John Edwards talked with Rielle Hunter about how they would have the Dave Matthews Band (good god, could Southern romance be more dead?) perform for them when they were living in the White House, after he'd won the presidency and after Elizabeth Edwards had died? Do we need to know that John had sex with Rielle in the same bed he slept with Elizabeth? Do we need to know about the sex tape and that while Andrew Young recognized John Edwards' face in the video (yes, he watched it--heck, he apparently reassembled it after Rielle had tried to remove the tape from the casing), he "couldn't attest to the other body parts belonging to Senator Edwards" or to Miss Hunter?

It's all very strange. And it's also all a bit . . . queer. Certainly that last part.

Other statements and facts queer up the story, too. For example, the first sentence out of Andrew Young's mouth on Friday's 20/20 interview on ABC TV was that when he first heard John Edwards speak, he "fell in love with him." Not "became mesmerized by him" or "inspired by him" or "enthralled with his message." No. In love with him. And Mr. Young not only said it once, he has said it a number of times in subsequent interviews.

While we're exploring all things queer, let's discuss this: How real is this marriage between Andrew Young and his wife? What straight, married woman, in love with her husband, would tolerate the intrusion of Rielle Hunter into their lives, having a pregnant, by most accounts "challenging" mistress of another man, hide out in their home, with their children, all while having to live down the bare-faced lie that her husband (Mr. Young) was really the father of Miss Hunter's baby, not John Edwards?

Come to think of it, there were an awful lot of camera shots of the Youngs holding hands throughout the 20/20 interview. There's rarely a scene where they're not holding hands, in fact. What's the point of that? Is there perhaps something else they're trying to prove, one that doesn't involve displaying mutual affection or even presenting a united front against the world?

And, finally, I don't think I'm the only one having, uh, homosexual thoughts about John Edwards. In a recent article in New York magazine, adapted from John Heilemann and Mark Halperin's book, Game Change: Obama and the Clintons, McCain and Palin, and the Race of a Lifetime, the authors note that Edwards had "always seemed . . . well, sorta asexual, at least to his staff."

Asexual--or homosexual? Granted, Mr. Edwards never exuded the overpowering testosterone that apparently is required behavior for the American male. Thus, some might mistake this for "homosexual tendencies."

However, I think they're missing the "Chapel Hill Industries" aspect: The Southern gentleman--as produced by the best schools and high society--isn't a brute; he is refined and polished. Others do the heavy lifting for him while he smiles, makes conversation, and lets you bask in his radiance.

Which makes it all the more easier to pull the wool over your eyes--or lift your skirt over your head.

* * *

Perhaps I'm grasping at pink straws where none exist. It has been known to happen. Back in Pittsburgh for a moment, I only recently realized, after 2-1/2 years of seeing numerous cars and trucks emblazoned with black-and-blue vanity plates and stickers, that these were not emblems of Pittsburgh's S&M pride, but, rather, citizens proudly supporting law enforcement. Although, admittedly, at times it's hard to tell the difference between the two groups, I am, nonetheless, sometimes too blinded by my pink-colored glasses to see things clearly.

However, I perceived rather quickly that John Edwards was not exactly what he claimed or appeared to be. Some of my aversion to him was that he seemed all too perfect--and way too pretty. Friends, especially from out-of-state, would tell me how impressed they were by him--which more often translated into how good they thought he looked. Never mind his politics, whatever they might be: He's handsome! So he must be right! Shades of Sarah Palin. Colors of Scott Brown.

To me, though, John Edwards's type--the auburn-haired, always-smiling, ever well-manicured, professional man--is a dime a dozen around the Triangle. The produce 'em by the truckload at UNC, all identical, all with the same pedigree, worldview, haircut, and freckle pattern. Ho hum.

On a deeper level, I knew, too, that he and Elizabeth Edwards had both been very successful, high-powered lawyers back home, and John himself had been a well-to-do trial lawyer, taking some very high-profile--and high-paying--cases. Not to be too judgmental, but in my experience, few people get to that point in life by being Mr. or Mrs. Nice Guy, living for others, thinking about the little guy and gal. That's why everyone in the U.S. House and Senate is such a dick, after all.

Still, when everyone else kept telling me I was being too cynical (who, me?)--especially when I claimed that the reason he and Elizabeth had two more children later in life was to make them look "Kennedy-esque" to the electorate (admittedly, a low blow, although I've probably gone lower)--I started to rethink my criticism. After all, $400 haircuts be damned, he did seem sincere about helping little Mr. and Mrs. America, bridging the wide gap between the haves and the have-nots in this country, a very real problem that few were addressing at the time and no one has successfully dealt with since Lyndon B. Johnson. And people smarter than me seemed to be responding to him. So maybe, just maybe, I might be wr . . .

Phew. I barely missed that dodgeball of contrition.

So, yeah, I'm cynical, but that doesn't mean I'm wrong. I'm generally not too far off the mark with my mistrust and measured responses to people and events.

Nonetheless, I can say that even on my most mistrustful days, I never, ever wanted to see this much revealed about John and Elizabeth Edwards, Rielle Hunter, and the Youngs. And while I wouldn't be above taking a quick peak at the fruit of John Edwards' loom under the right circumstances (a Playgirl centerfold in the offing?), my need to know everything and my schadenfreude have their limits.

And those limits were reached around 10:54 pm, Friday, 29 January 2010, the moment when Andrew Young used the term "body parts."

Really, I don't need to know anymore. Does anyone?