Re: Loretta Dillon is Stone Cold Guilty

Part Three

by Walter Cronkite

Good evening.

Within two years of high school graduation the main character in our
story had gone to one college, transferred to another, gotten pregnant,
and become a mother and thereafter a wife. Another two years passed and
she was divorced. This could be attributed to her continual misuse of
manipulation, emotional blackmail, and feigned love. She wanted real
love, of course, but without any to offer, she quickly learned to trade
sex for favors, and ultimately her wedded misery became divorced
disaster.

Money continued to be an issue with her. Her parents gave her money
regularly, of course, but this could not help her with her jealousy,
competition, or alienation of affection. Nor did it help with her
earning a living. The only money she owed after graduation was a modest
school loan that was paid off with additional help from her parents
generosity. Once divorced, they helped her to secure a well-paying job
in town at her dadâ??s company, and found her a nice house that
they helped her to purchase. By now she had two tiny girls. She was
back in Pleasantville, and the seventies were over.

Meanwhile, the underlying resentment at her entirely imagined childhood
deprivation, combined with two years of paucity during her disastrous
marriage, became the basis of her justification in subsequent years for
buying anything and everything she wanted without a moments reflection
about fiscal or moral responsibility. She began having free weekends,
disposable cash, and near school-aged children, so she gleefully
plunged into the 80s single style, more than making up for what she
considered lost time. Her social life paralleled her financial status;
it was always either terrible or worse. Her behavior quickly
deteriorated into moral depravity, wherein she was leaving her small
children with any warm body, and finding comfort in any other warm body
that made itself available. Interestingly, she did not bring into the
world any more unwanted, unloved children for over a decade.

If we compare her self-serving, hedonistic lifestyle with the models
she had as a child, they make absolutely no sense. There was her
mother: ever cautious, ever present, church going, essentially in
charge of the family and responsible for feeding and clothing eight
children; providing for their well-being and education, and supervising
the household at all times. Then there was her father, generously
spending money on his family, never at a loss for a job or provision,
demonstrating a dedicated, faithful love to his wife and to their
children. Neither of her parents had a drinking problem or financial
woes, and they seldom left the family except for an occasional dinner
out. Her siblings took their lead from their parents, maintaining
sustained marriages, long-term employment, and faithful commitments to
their spouses and children. She, however, tended to flip-flop,
depending on her circumstances, between little commitment and no
commitment at all.

As with most dysfunctional people, little of her tell-tale addictive
behavior was evident at first, but in time it began to make itself
known. In her very unbalanced life, she was not just financially
irresponsible, she was irresponsible with her employment and her
children. As a result, she was faced with calls from Child Protective
Services, and her oldest was removed from her home on at least two
occasions. She maintained that the problem was with her child, not her.
She was never able to discover why she had such a malignant
relationship with money, friends, sex, her siblings, or her various
employers, nor was she ever emancipated from the grip of her guilt, the
disappointment of her parents, or the consequences of her terrible
decisions. Much as she tried, she could not detach from all the
emotional baggage her lifestyle choices carried. This soon led to her
abuse of alcohol and drugs.

Unbeknownst to her family, the bar scene became a substitute for real
love and attention. Instead of taking her daughters shopping and
spending the afternoon with them, she would hand them over to a sitter
and spend the money on herself. Instead of dealing with the mall crowd
or choosing and wrapping gifts, she would make excuses about her time
or her heavy responsibilities in a belated card. Instead of spending
time with her growing children when she came home from work, she would
get a sitter and visit the local bar. She became a well-known patron,
and this became a daily practice even when she had to take them to the
bar with her. Soon their world revolved around drinking. Because she
could not face the consequences of her choices, she found refuge in
escapism.

When the comfort of alcohol became a substitute for real accomplishment
and success, she quickly became dependant upon it to deal with her
life. She hated it, but she was addicted. She soon needed to take time
from her work, lying that she was making calls or addressing future
clients. Her children lost respect for her because her hours were so
sporadic and she was so undependable. So, too, she lost all respect for
herself, entering into yet another terrible marriage to a person who
was a drug dealer with a criminal past. This is how she became
introduced and subsequently addicted to crack cocaine. He was a monster
whose presence in her home would leave permanent scars on her and her
children.

Having lost sight of lifes precious gifts and her responsibilities, she
became reckless. She threw money around like it was paper. She lied,
cheated, and defrauded her parents, her children, and herself. Her
behavior was repulsive and dishonest. She fabricated insurance fraud,
stole from her childrenâ??s bank accounts, and was soon wanted by
the local police for various misdemeanors and for leaving her children
for days on end while she pursued her next high.

But then, her addiction to alcohol and cocaine could never replace the
attention, affection and approval that she craved in its place.

And that's the way it was.

.

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