Teenaged Lorna is in a pickle, or is she just pickled? Let’s see what’s in store for her…

I certainly don't remember things ever getting this bad...but my memory is a bit fuzzy on some details.

When I wasn’t drinking, I was craving. Nowadays, I would be diagnosed with OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder). Back then, I just had quirky habits. Okay. Maybe I was weird. You be the judge.

Well, I am not! Obsessive, that is. Just because I had certain standards and routines that must be upheld or the world would end, it didn't mean that I belonged in therapy.

  1. I needed to be perfect. My homework was fit to be framed. I knew all the answers in class and I knew my teachers knew it. I was quick-witted, getting laughs from people who might otherwise snub an insufferable perfectionist. You get the picture. Being perfect is hard work if you’re perfect; if you’re not, you take a heaping dollop of [insert favorite drug] to ease the burden. At least I did.

    Health care costs due to ginormous self-imposed stress: bazillions of dollars. Self-medicated relaxation: priceless!

  2. I was the girlfriend of a popular athlete, so I needed to be the best, most attractive girlfriend I could be. I lost weight and kept my curves in all the right places. If I knew how I managed that, I’d be a rich woman cruising the Infomercial circuit. I was sexy jail-bait, loving the attention but not the consequences.  Drinking made it easier to be easy.

    I'm sure this was taken without my permission after I fell off my chair from having had too many Black Russians. Come to think of it, this probably isn't me; it's a figment of my boyfriend's over-sexed imagination. I wouldn't have looked quite so alluring sprawled out on the floor...

  3. I craved carbs as a birthright. Not knowing that alcohol metabolized into simple sugar, I was a sitting duck for the stuff. When I wasn’t drinking, I was eating anything sugary or that would quickly convert to sugar: saltine crackers by the fist-full with a chaser of Pepsi, Bazooka Bubble gum (chewed only until the sugar was gone and then replaced), Fiddle-Faddle (served in boxes way too small), and what I called “Pink Things” (wintergreen mint candies that were pink and more sweet than minty). I’d eat a bag a day. Mom would’ve saved a lot on her grocery bill if she’d just bought a gallon of cheap vodka a week for her “Good” middle child.

    Yummy! Excuse me, I have to run to the grocery store.

I kept my sexy figure by walking, mowing the lawn, riding my bike and dancing. My sisters and I were legendary in our little rural town for our uncanny rhythm. We should have been Solid Gold Dancers. Dancing to a loud rock band–even a really bad one, which was the only kind available in our area–was freedom for me. I could have fun in public without my alcohol crutch.

Yup! That's us! Only my sisters are the same race, we wore less skimpy outfits because we weren't quite that fit, and would've broken our legs with boots like that. Otherwise, I'd swear this is a picture of us after "Jumpin' Jack Flash" just got butchered by the band.

I’d wear hip-hugger jeans and a tube top (don’t laugh, that was the fashion back then), and shake my sober booty with my sisters. Not even my boyfriend would dare dance when the “Earl Girls” were doing their Solid Gold routine on the gym floor.

The drinking came later in the evening, when he was ready to leave and get horizontal. I loved those dances. I got a taste of being Liberated Lorna with all my senses fully in gear. But the pull to be a perfect girlfriend yanked me away from my sisters, the music, and the magic of being “me.” I invariable let myself melt into the whirly-swirly world of “not-really-me.”

Not Lorna! She's such a smart, polite young lady...

You know what happens to teens who drink and engage in naughty behavior. Did Lorna become one of “those girls?”