Modern Woman of the Con

Copyright 2012: singeronthesand

The lips of a seductive woman are oh, so sweet,

her soft words are oh, so smooth,

but it won't be long before she's gravel in your mouth,

a pain in your gut, a wound in your heart.

So, my friend, listen closely;

don't treat my words casually.

Keep your distance from such a woman;

absolutely stay out of her neighborhood!

Proverbs 5:3-4,7

The crew next door have scattered to the four winds, proverbially.  The male boarder has finally realized a hopeless situation and found a nice trailer park down on Colonial Beach away from the family and their mess.  The daughter is in jail for her 3rd DUI, her boyfriend is wandering the streets, and the pit bull is once again ensconced in the house, hoping that someone will come by and feed him/water him/let him out once a day.  That leaves the woman, who is at the very heart of the entire story.

It appears that my neighbor is a con woman who has plied her trade for years among family and friends.  She has had a good-paying job up until recently, so it wasn't that she didn't have any money.  She just didn't want to use any of hers.  In the last four years, she has talked 3 different men into moving in with her and putting their names on the utility bills.  She then asked for cash to pay the bills and, you guessed it, didn't pay them.  When the electricity was shut off the first time, she asked the man to pay the $1600 they were in arrears.  He would not, so that account was closed and she found another sucker.  When the second account got up around $1200 (the man had already fled), she talked her daughter's erstwhile boyfriend into putting his name on an account.  He quit his job shortly after that, and here we go again.  She trolls for men on the Internet, concentrating on those who are older (lonely) and wealthy (more money to spend).

Her out-of-state son, who co-owns the house, sent money each month for half the mortgage payment.  It was never paid.  He sent money for repairs on an old classic car that is housed in the garage.  That $$ disappeared as well.  Now the house is up for foreclosure, the electricity and water have been turned off, and she can't understand why her friends do not want to lend her their couch to sleep on.  In the midst of all this is a beautiful little 5-year-old girl who is living pillar-to-post with a woman who can't be trusted any further than you can throw her.  As modern day stories go, this one is really, really sad.