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Crazy for love, just a little more than most

By HOWARD TROXLER
Published February 8, 2007

In my inexpert experience, no one is immune from being driven crazy by love.

The more solid they seem, the crazier they go. The longer they survive unscathed, the worse the madness when it finally comes. There is no fool, after all, like a grownup.

How many of us know of at least one career-and-family man who abandoned his responsibilities to behave like an idiot?

Women, too - heaven knows. How many impressive, accomplished women I have known who took that trip through temporary insanity over some schlump not worth her trouble!

Have you ever been the one?

Have you ever dialed the telephone, over and over? Written a crazed letter and sent it before you had time to reconsider? Deliberately driven past somebody's home or office? Pestered your friends to distraction by boo-hooing about it obsessively?

No? Never? Not you? Well, good for you, then.

But I have known folks who have done all that, and more, and even dumber things - down to dragging a key across the ex-lover's car, or leaving raving messages on answering machines, or spying on their ex's new boyfriend/girlfriend and picking a fight.

Low-class behavior, performed only by the cast of Jerry Springer shows? Heck, no - I'm talking about lawyers and editors and doctors, too. Crazy as outhouse rats, all of them, at least for a while.

And as we now see, it can happen even to astronauts.

Astronauts!

Okay, so this one is an extreme case. Not that many people drive 900 miles wearing diapers (good grief!) and carrying pepper spray and latex gloves, intending who-knows-what mayhem.

But, I bet you, lots of people have thought about doing stuff that ranked pretty high on the crazy scale. And people do insane things all the time that don't make the papers, because they weren't astronauts and didn't get arrested.

In no way do I condone behavior that menaces someone else. In our modern society, we appreciate the inherent danger of such conduct and even label it as a serious crime, stalking.

And yet, since no worse harm was done, I mostly feel sorry for Lisa Nowak, who has now officially Ruined Her Life.

In a few hours, she went from being the closest thing America has to a superhero to being a figure of national ridicule and salacious cruelty. She is the latest exhibit in the 24-hour media freak show.

Having switched sides from Normal to Abnormal, she can never recover her past life. This is not our way, not in a society that tolerates no temporary aberration - not in kids making mistakes in school, let alone in lapsed politicians, let alone in astronauts. The only class of disgraced persons who get a second act are sex-scandal televangelists, and even they keep an asterisk next to their name.

If she is of the mind, she might write a book or become a talk-show oddity for a while, but she isn't going to be operating any more robots or hanging out in the international space station.

Most people are luckier and manage not to do anything so drastic as to cause permanent damage. They get on with their lives and careers, albeit sheepishly if they have any sense. The luckiest of all are able to slap themselves on the forehead years later and say, "What an idiot I was!" It is hard-earned wisdom, I tell you what.

[Last modified February 8, 2007, 05:52:34]