I must be nuts...

Everytime I open my eyes in the morning (usually between 7:00 and 7:15am...it should be 6:45, but screw it, I'd rather sleep in and be late) I ask myself if I am nuts. Really. When I started off, I decided that I wanted to work with criminals, and work with them to get the behavioral and psychological help they needed to make their lives work. Somewhere along the line I made the decision to work with kids. Right. Okay. If we help them as kids, they won't have as many issues when they are adults, right? right. Only what I am discovering is that the blasted kids have problems too, big problems: psychosis, bipolar disorder, depression with psychotic tendencies----damn if these kids don't see stuff the same way the adults I used to work with do. I mean really, have we really gone so far as a society that our children have no choice but to sink deep into the depths of severe psychiatic disability to cope? So I thought about it, and I said, "Forget it. I'll go back to working with adults. Adults are easier, they make their own decisions, no need to go through case workers and get forms signed by 80 million other people to get them help...they can CONSENT." But when I finally get into my car, at around 8:00 am (should be 7:45 am, but who can get ready that fast) and drive to see my clients, and walk into a classroom and see their eyes light up as they run to knock me over with a hug, or watch with a smile as I park my car and they are jumping up and down on the sidewalk in front of their house with excitement, or see them use their words for the first time instead of their fists to get their point across, I think, "Maybe I am where I'm supposed to be." And as I am looking down at my dirt-smeared jeans, and the fingerpaint that decorates my sleeves and hands, I know I am.

That don't make you smart

So I've come to the realization that I have spent more than half of my life in school in one form or another. People have actually looked at me in awe and said, "Wow, you must be so smart and intelligent." I quickly correct those people with a line from "Corrina, Corrina": You went on and graduated from college but it don't make you SMART. It's true. I know lots of people who have gone on to graduate college and go on to earn a J.D., or an M.A., and their complete lack of understanding of the world outside of their profession is a mystery. It's scary what people consider "smart" or "intelligent." A perfect example was my college roommate.

The year I turned 18 I was on cloud 9. Not only was I an "adult" (in the legal sense anyway) I was going away to college. Ooohhh! Late nights! No mom on my back! Yippee...not so much for me. I had one focus: To graduate and get the hell out of Homewood, and, if it could be done, Pittsburgh altogether.

So there I was, up at Penn State McKeesport. I got roomed with this Chinese girl from Queens (won't mention her name here). She was nice and all, we had polite conversation. We talked about our families.

"Well yeah, my dad is a CEO of his own company, and my mom is a fashonista," she said in her thick New York-esqe accent.

"Interesting." I said. Not really finding it interesting. "My dad died when I was 11 and my mom works as a secretary at her church." Silence. I could tell where this relationship was going to go.

"Oh," she said as if the idea of my mom having such a shitty job gave her card blanc to give me sympathy. I'd rather have someone hate me than feel pity for me. Thanks Ponyboy.

We didn't talk too much after that. Polite greetings, no real exchanges. Until the iron incident.

One Friday night, when she was getting ready for a party, my roommate decided that she should iron a blouse she had.

"It's so wrinkled!" she exclaimed. "What am I going to do? I can't go out like this!"

I turned around slowly from my desk where I was pouring over my algebra homework, and tried not to smirk. "How 'bout an iron? Irons usually work really well to get out wrinkles," not bothering to mask my dripping sarcasm.

Her face brightened. "Oh yeah! Thanks so much! That's a great idea! Now, where is my iron. I know I have one..." and so for the next 20 minutes I listened to her mutter to herself while she dug through her Versace shoes and Coach handbags to find her elusive iron. I tried in vain to keep my mind on the Pythagorean Therom.

My roommate finally extracted her iron from her plethlora of designer shoes, handbags, and t-shirts that cost more than my entire wardrobe. She put up my ironing board, plugged in the iron and set to work.

I continued to plog away, making corrections and revisions on my work, until I heard her grumble, "My iron is broken!" I closed my eyes, gathering my patience.

"What do you mean, what's wrong with it?" I asked.

"You come from a family of housekeepers, Gene-Leigh. Can you please help me? I've never had to use an iron in my life." I looked at her dumbstruck. "Huh?" I asked, my eraser poised in midair.

"My maid always ironed my clothes. I never learned how."

So Pythagorus and his theorum would have to wait. The girl who never ironed was much more interesting.

"You've got to be kidding me," I said before I could stop myself. "Okay, what's the problem with it? The light isn't coming on, or what?"

"There's no steam," she exclaimed.

I tried the iron, and sure enough, there was no steam coming out of it. I changed the setting, and still: no steam.

Then I checked the water level.

"Honey, you need water in the iron to make steam come out," I said calmly.

And do you know what that airhead said?

"Oh."

Just cause you in college, don't make you smart.