It's always funny until someone puts an eye out... or embezzles $20,000

I had an e-mail exchange and then went to lunch with a guy I knew from high school.  As a matter of fact, he was the valedictorian of our class.  During the email exchange, I invited he and his partner to come down to the house for dinner.  I said we could look up former classmates on the Michigan Correctional Institution database and do a shot for everyone we found who'd done time.  He said that we might die of alcohol poisoning if we didn't exempt everyone from Cement City and TRUST ME, Internet, it was funny because it's true.

So one night I did start plugging in names in said database.  And was not exactly surprised, but somewhat saddened, to find the name of Lisa V.  It seems that Lisa won't be attending the class reunion because she's serving up to SIX YEARS IN PRISON FOR EMBEZZLEMENT.

I wasn't surprised because frankly, Lisa always had serious problems with authority. (Hmmm... sound like any other Lisa we all know?)  She was extremely strong-willed and where some parents crack down on their kids' behavior, Lisa's just laid back like Oriental carpets and let her go.

Back in the day (and yes, I'm old enough to use phrases like that, so SHUT IT) I had what you might call a Savior/martyr complex.  I had a habit of befriending people who needed emotional rescuing, then ignoring my own emotional well-being to tend to them.  Lisa was one of those people.  I invited her to spend one entire spring break with us, hoping that if she spent some time with a family who actually had some discipline and structure, she might like it.  It didn't work.

Late in high school, Lisa ran away from home.  She told me she was going, I told the drama teacher.  When she actually left, he called the police.  She was back at school two days later and wrote me a note, proudly announcing that the police in five counties had been looking for her.  That's pretty much when I knew she was lost.

So all the jokes about people doing time?  Real funny, until it's someone you actually know.  Someone you had a feeling might end up going down that path and that you tried to help.  Someone you cared about, and called a friend.

When do people make that turn?  When does the petty shoplifting many of us engaged in become an obsession to get more and more, to keep breaking laws, to commit more and more crimes?  Is it the people that don't get caught that keep going until they reach felony level?  Or do the rest of us just grow up?

Comments

[Steve]

Dude....they cross the line when THEY GET CAUGHT. Otherwise, they are just like you or me. Well..just like you. :)

[Sain't Christopher]

Wait . . . you're originally from Mittenlandia? How could I not know this. It all makes sense now. You live in the South as part of an out reach program.

[Lisa]

The Michigan Offender Tracking program is one of my favorite hobbies, especially useful for pre-reunion planning.

[Michelle]

I think the MOT should be considered a necessity and mandatory before considering attending one's class reunion or any such event that requires contact with past classmates.