Not a happy post

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At one of the several duty stations my husband was assigned to while serving in the military, I worked at a little hospital as an admission clerk. I enjoyed the job very much because I worked with a bunch of crazy people, and we didn't have many patients each day so we had way too much time to goof off. There was a little old lady who was the day shift switchboard operator, she had been there forever. She used to always wear this little pink smock. I had been introduced to her when I started, but I rarely interacted with her as I usually worked the night shift, but I remember her.

Some time after my husband had been assigned somewhere else I received an email from one of the nurses I used to work with, in it she relayed the horrible news that this poor old lady had been found at home tied to a chair, where she had been beaten to death. It was dreadful news. I remember telling my husband that this woman had worked her whole life, and lived her life only to have it ended by someone so evil it was just unbearable to think about. I don't know if the crime was ever solved.

There was this kid who used to hang out with us in high school. There was a big group of us, and we used to go in the mountains and get drunk on Mad Dog 20/20, horrible stuff tastes the same going down as it does coming back up, and we would listen to music, and just be kids. Pretty harmless stuff for the most part. This one kid, we tolerated him I guess. None of the girls liked him because he would develop immediate crushes on any girl who would give him any attention. He was particularly fond of my best friend who was not interested in him in the least.

Well he had this thing that he did. He would get drunk and then it would start, his poor me, I want to die, nobody loves me, I hate myself, I'm a loser and I want to die. The first time the girls would feel sorry for him and try to tell him not to feel that way, and give him all of this sympathy. When it became a pattern, everyone would pretty much just roll their eyes and suggest he go find some place to pass out.

He always did that. I didn't like hanging out with him. I thought he was strange. I tolerated him for the most part he was my boyfriend's friend. Well it turns out the little creep was a rapist and ended up going to prison for life for raping and killing two people. One of which was a 12 year old girl. He dumped the body of the little girl right at the very spot where in high school we used to all go and party. Bastard should have been put to death for what he did, but he got life in prison.

One night my mother's cousin's husband was talking on the phone with his son when a man stormed through the front door with a knife and stabbed him 17 times. Luckily, his son heard the commotion and called 911, or he would have died. He almost did die. He lost most of the blood in his body. He was so traumatized that he has never really been the same. The man who tried to kill him was a disgruntled employee, the cousin's husband had been his boss and laid him off because he was a shitbag loser. The man went to prison. He did not get life in prison. He should have at the very least been sent to prison for the rest of his life.

There was a girl I went to high school with. She got pregnant. Her mother immediately dropped her off at a group home for pregnant teen agers and drove off in her Cadillac on her merry way. The girl went on welfare, and eventually met a G.I. who she married. He was not the father of the little girl that she had, but it didn't matter, in no time at all she was pregnant with his baby. One day he killed her little girl. He hit her in the stomach so hard that he ruptured her spleen and she died from internal injuries. She was 17 months old. He went to prison. I believe he got 30 years. He will be out in about 10 years I suppose. He will be in his 40's. Still young enough to enjoy some sort of life.

Want to know something even more strange? The mother of the baby, at one time she had a relationship with the above mentioned murderer--the one who raped and murdered two people. Basically, she has been involved with at least two murderers. Talk about your lousy taste in men. I stopped speaking to her many years ago. She still tries to contact me every so often. Usually she calls my mom and asks her to have me call her. My mom knows I want nothing to do with this woman, and so never gives her any information about me.

Perhaps it says I have lousy taste in friends, but in reality, I was never really good friends with either of those people. They were around, there were lots of people around, but something in my gut always told me something was wrong there. I knew it. I was young and much more trusting and tolerant, and I ignored my gut.

I think sometimes we ignore our gut to our own detriment. We over ride it to avoid hurting people's feelings. I try not to do that anymore. If I don't feel right about someone, I don't waste nearly as much time exploring those feelings. I just move on.

The reason I brought all of this up is because it has been on my mind. The other day I read a post by Tony at Blah Blah Blog, it seems someone near him has been murdered. Had her life taken from her by an evil murderer. I have been thinking about how close to home these things hit sometimes. Sometimes the world is an awful scary place to live, even in this great nation of ours.