Honors Student

22^nd March 2012

Dear Cassi,

       

There is a bit of business that happened in middle school that would be a major shaping agent for the next six years of my life. Up until the age of eleven I was classified as learning disabled. Understand here that schools get more funding for the learning disabled so they have no interest in curing this problem.

       

Now it just so happens that the school also gets money for the honors students and that one can be both. This contradiction is most perplexing given that a student must have problems to be learning disabled and yet must be more capable than average to be in honors.

       

So they tested me for honors aptitude. I went into one of the buildings with a math teacher who had these blue eyes that darted about the room as if he were on drugs. They gave me an English test. What the math teacher was doing there I cannot say but they gave me a set of pictures and told me to write a story.

       

When I was done they explained to me that I would be graded on how many long words I used. I think this was words over seven letters however I cannot recall. As the written word and I had never gotten on well I had written my story in the smaller words I was better with and so had scored poorly.

Then they saw the word ‘jalopy’ in my story and decided to count it even as it was one letter short. That day I became an honors man and the school put a few more dollars in their budget. I only made it through honors classes because they gave me special consideration.

Still the truth in this regard is that my learning disorder was like a broken bone that had healed wrong. The problem progressed only because it was never looked after and I suffered so that they could make a few extra dollars.

Hear the roar of the all mighty dollar, little sister

Richard Leland Neal

Also updating today!

Random Street Theater a Comic

http://randomstreet.blogspot.com/

Psychopathology

21^st March 2012

Dear Cassi,

       

Today I saw the mental health counselor. It was a good lot of work over getting a simple prescription refilled but it had to be done. I slept a few hours of my morning and made haste to see this fellow who would give me leave to see the doctor.

       

It is a formality with my medical provider that I must first see a Counselor or Psychologist before I can see a Psychiatrist. This being that the first two are Master Arts or Philosophical Doctor rather than Medical Doctor and are without the ability to grant my prescription.

       

In all truth, I have no resentment to this formality because of how important it is for most folks. A psychiatric medication is like a crutch that we use to help the mind heal and in said healing that crutch should one day be discarded. Thus, we may think of the Counselor as we would think of a Physical Therapist. The Counselor is there to make the bits of us that do not work do as they should.    

       

By the nature of our interview I told the Counselor of my intention to use the medication to quash my ill feeling as I conduct systematic desensitization. He told me that he was surprised that I was so functional a man given my history and the stresses of my life. I imagine, had he read about me and not seen me, that he would have expected a drooling idiot rather than a man.

       

He told me that I appeared to be a rather nice person. I have never claimed that to be true but I got the feeling he meant something else. In any case, he cleared me to see the doctor and that is what he was there for so I must concede his usefulness.

Stay safe, little sister,

Richard Leland Neal 

Also updating today!

Random Street Theater a Comic

http://randomstreet.blogspot.com/

Cook Top

20^th March 2012

Dear Cassi,

Today I ordered a new cook top. What a cook top is as opposed to a stove I have less than total certainty but I needed a 36 inch one. I do believe that a cooker or stove is the one with the oven and the stand along heat transfer cooking device is what I needed.

       

The old one, which is now barely visible under the stains, has one dead burner and gives off uneven fire from the heads. It can no longer brown food so I rather had to replace it in good time. In the last six months I’ve done away with my old washer, drier, dishwasher, refrigerator, and oven. This was the last piece to go, I hope, and the expense has been rather staggering.

       

Well, Paul pays for a good bit of this because I do the cooking. Grown folks should be able to cook on their own but he can never get it right. Still the hope is that with the new device I can get more heat in the pans and scorch and singe at my leisure. With the old cook top I cook and cook but can’t get the heat high enough to crisp the edges of my vegetables.

       

One would think that blue fire is blue fire so that it would just take a hair longer to heat but no. The gas just didn’t want to come out the lines on this old thing. So I should have the new one by the end of the month. Sometimes it’s just time to let go.

Stay safe, little sister

Richard Leland Neal

Also updating today!

Random Street Theater a Comic

http://randomstreet.blogspot.com/