It’s debatable to historians whether Lem Billings wrote a sexual note to JFK at Choate. It’s debatable to historians whether Joe Kennedy Jr. ever loved Pat Wilson. And if he did love her exactly how much he loved her.
I think he loved her. Deeply. Irretrievably. And I haven’t always thought that. But…now I mostly do.
What did Pat Wilson know about sex?
A shocking amount by today’s standards, possibly.
She knew that the liars who pretend not to care like Joe Kennedy Jr. are the most desperate and clingy in the end. If you can hook them they never let go. All you have to do is hook them well…
“That poor girl. She doesn’t know that loving you is the worst way to get to you.” – Betty Draper Francis
Hooking them means outsmarting them. Making yourself above them. Ruling them. Leaving them grasping for your heart in the darkness of their vain weakness.
“Was she looking for a new husband?” asks a historian. Joe Jr. would surely have left her! …Had he lived.
One wonders. How did she get as far as she did with him? Would she have ever totally disappeared? Possibly not. And I’m not sure how much she even cared that she had far too much control in their relationship. It might have felt comfortable to her.
Would he have married her? Well, first of all, don’t forget he died deeply upset that he couldn’t reach her on the phone to say “goodbye/I’ll see you later.” Then don’t forget that his sister was her acknowledged friend. That she wrote his mother furiously. Aggressively. …Don’t forget that she was once an English Aristocrat and that the Kennedy’s languished in misery, longing for that sort of hierarchical approval and acknowledgment. Pat…could have haunted the rest of his living life, pulling at his heart, turning him into her little plaything until one of them died. Maybe that’s exactly what did happen.
Because what Pat knew…was that it’s a lie. All that coldness. All that ugly evil…is a lie. Sometimes love really isn’t reciprocated…but men don’t inherently not care. That’s a vile lie. A 20th Century superstition. A cruel, mentally twisted tool used by many for a variety of tragic and at times ugly reasons.
“It’s science!” says a man in 1999 with elated, smug joy. He secretly thinks of JFK like Bill Clinton did…longing to emulate his perceived untouchable masculine virility. …But what if Jack was mostly gay? In love with a secretly straight man who didn’t even love him back and who Jack had to forcibly rape while high on meth to get anything from towards the end of his tragic life? Psychologically devour with false friendship. So much for emulating a “straight sex-god.”
It’s beyond cringeworthy. It’d be funny if it wasn’t so sad.
But maybe…Pat and Joe are or will be happy in Heaven. And isn’t that a miracle? If it’s true, it’s God. We didn’t help them.
Keen to Cross the Pond 