She grabs groceries at the neighborhood Jewel. But Peggy Matzdorf's life never will be the same. She hands her check to the Jewel clerk and that familiar searing pain sucks her breath away as the clerk looks at it and asks if she is Alli's mom. The experiences follow a similar path for other survivors. Edna Roberts, Jim Still, Leah Johnson and Denise Wright all have had their lives transformed by the pain drunken drivers parked upon them.
Routines return, but nothing is normal.
And in the time it takes for metal to carve into metal, the survivors find themselves unwilling authorities, aching activists against drunken driving. And the maximum sentences for drunken driving are not long enough. Judges need to be tougher. People need to become more responsible and own up to their actions, she says. Naperville resident Leah Johnson's daughter, Laura, was killed 15 years ago by a drunken driver when she was minutes from home.