"If You Come From Trash, You Return To Trash!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                      No, darlings, this is not a quote from one of my Miss Porter lectures, though I can easily understand how such a statement could be mistaken for one.  It is actually from Carl Healey, the perp in the "Cold Case" episode, "Our Boy Is Back."

                                       Carl's story is eerily similar to that of Ned Lasky, whom I wrote about awhile back, in the "Law And Order" episode, "Pledge."  Ned, to recall, was ashamed of his blue collar parents--his father was a factory worker, his mother worked in a bakery--and origins; he wanted the Upper Class Ivy League life he envisioned for himself.  But his parents could only afford a state school, the University Of Massachusetts.  When her tried to infiltrate an Amherst sorority party, he was snobbishly dismissed, and carried a lifelong grudge, with tragic consequences.

                                       Ned had brains, but no looks.  Carl had looks, but no brains.  His origins were even worse; his mother was trailer trash, there was no father, and his sister had become a prostitute.  Nice, huh????????????

                                         Carl yearned.  He was a reader, and yearned for the intellectual life.  But maybe he hadn't the money--or the skills-- to attain it.  So, he hang out in libraries, talking up intellectual girls, referencing things to make them think he knew something, even though he probably had never read any of the books discussed.

                                           When this backfired, Carl dealt with things by turning into a serial rapist.  Both Ned and Carl ruined their lives by ruining others'.    And they also settled for women whom they felt to be beneath them; in Carl's case, Bridget Young, who was one step above trailer trash.

                                               Poor Carl and Ned.  The problem was they were straight.  What they needed to be was gay.  Gay men are maligned early in life, so learn the importance and value of status, and social class distinctions.  It is hard to come up from trash, but because gay men have nothing to lose, and everything to gain, it is easier for them than for others. 

                                                Both men here were doomed both by their class origins, and their sexual orientation!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                                And both, no matter how strong their delusions, remained trash!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!