Playground (4)

Playground: A Childhood Lost Inside The Playboy Mansion By: Jennifer Saginor Read: March 18, 2015 The story starts with the author is 6, her parents have divorced and she is with her father. Dad is a doctor in Beverly Hills, know as Dr Feelgood. He is good friends with Hugh Hefner and spends a great deal of time at the Playboy Mansion where he has his own room. While dad is playing backgammon with Hef, Jennifer is free to run around, feel monkeys, play in the pool, order room service and play video games. She thinks it is the ideal life. However she is also exposed to naked women, couples having sex, rampant drug use. But perhaps worst of all is her fathers attitude toward women in general and his great anger at his ex-wife. She and her younger sister spend their young years playing at the Mansion but are sworn to secrecy not to tell their mother. She eventually finds out and the parents enter into a bitter custody battle which is shocking in their anger toward each other and their utter disregard for their children. The kids become just a prize to claim in the battle. Eventually when she is about 13 Jennifer moves in with her father, she does this after an argument with her mother. This sets off a chain of events that will forever impact her life. With her father out partying all the time she is left alone at home. No parents, separated from her sister, her sadness lead to an out of control life, lots of drugs, out all night partying lovers... all this before she can legally drive a car. As time goes on Dad becomes more and more out of control. Vicky a 19 year heroin addict who had ties to a Columbian drug lord. As Dad descends into heroin addition he becomes more and more paranoid collecting guns, security and generally scarring the hell out of her daughter who feels trapped. Unable to return to her mother who tells her 'you should have thought about that when you moved out' and a father that gives his 17 year old a loaded hand guns with instructions to sleep with it. There really is no conclusion to the book, the author is now in her 40's and talks about how she is estranged from her mother and sister and the lasting scars her childhood left on her life. She does this in a matter of fact way rather than trying to generate sympathy. An interesting book but deeply disturbing that parents could be this reckless with their children.