Less than two miles from my home in Naperville is the beautifully restored Victorian house where Marilyn Lemak allegedly drugged and then smothered her three precious children in their beds. Like many others I have driven by the oversize doll’s house, tears blurring my vision, heaviness in my gut, and asked, “What caused this woman’s dark demise?”
But one thing I am not asking is, “What is happening to Naperville?”
Recent newspaper stories have made much of what they call the Naperville facade–the beautiful exteriors now assumed to hide diabolical secrets, as if the tragedy of Marilyn Lemak now defines our city.
Contrary to current assumptions, even in suburbia we are fully aware that despair can–and does–occur everywhere. We are not immune to it, nor are we ignorant of it.
Still, mean-spirited doomsters proclaim it’s about time that Naperville–the city too good to be true–should get its comeuppance, that it somehow deserves this dark dose of reality. But of course such things should not happen anywhere. And although it’s true Naperville is a city in mourning, it is not a city in decline.
Hope still has a home in Naperville, where behind most of these so-called “facades” reside thousands upon thousands of loving homes where children are truly cherished, truly safe. One lone woman who placed hands over the faces of her own children to end their lives should not overshadow the scores of Naperville mothers who will tenderly kiss the faces of their children when they tuck them into bed tonight.
Marilyn Lemak does not define Naperville any more than she defines motherhood. Nor does she threaten what is still good and positive here. One woman’s solitary walk into darkness does not deprive us of the light.
