The Goose Egg, the Advocate, and a Good Pillow

Jesse

Zero. A goose egg. That's the line from Ryan's entry that stuck with me. He says he busted his ass to get to school, made attendance because he thought it was the law, spoke English for four years of high school, and the credit he got for all of it was none. Not half credit. Not a single point.

Donna Trump

Nothing! Years of showing up, nothing! And look at what he was carrying. A lazy eye, a crossed eye, all the way through senior year, and he finishes. He graduates early. Ryan says it's a total fucking miracle, and you know what? He's right. That's a winner. That is a winner, Jesse. And what does the state exam say to that winner? You didn't meet the general standard. Unbelievable. Total disaster of a scorecard.

Jesse

In wrestling you learn the crowd can see exactly what happened in the ring, and the paperwork can still tell a different story. Ryan's point is that the test picks one thing, his comprehension level, holds it up like the whole man, and ignores the progress he made everywhere else. He calls that cherry picking. By his account it also got him moved into a special room, and that's the part he says hurt.

Donna Trump

And then the sugarcoating. This is my favorite, and by favorite I mean it makes me furious. They tell him, oh, you're not stupid, you're not dumb, you just need a little extra help. Congratulations, you're not an idiot, please report to the special room! Ryan says it's not kind at all, and I get it. Say it once, maybe it's nice. Say it over and over, five days a week, it's a verdict wearing a cardigan.

Jesse

That's the number that gets me, the five days a week. He's not describing one bad afternoon. He says he was traumatized repeatedly, year after year, until English One and English Two were done. And then he says the housing authority dragged the same bad memory back up. Same feeling of being put on the spot, of being the target, of everybody holding a clipboard but nobody standing next to him.

Donna Trump

Nobody standing next to him! That's the whole story. That's the whole thing. A big building, a big policy, and one guy in the middle of the room. And honestly, what are they even in trouble for? That's Ryan's question. What are these students in trouble for? Fair question. Somebody answer it.

Jesse

Which brings us to the best idea in the whole entry. Ryan says if you're accused of violating a policy, you should get an advocate, an assistant, representation, and it should be mandatory unless you sign a waiver. In writing, I'd add, so nobody can say you waived it with a nod.

Donna Trump

Mandatory! Not optional, not a pamphlet in a drawer, mandatory! You want to put a person through a hearing, you bring a person to stand with them. And I love his second move. The institution says you are the student, you are the tenant, you, you, you. Ryan says no, you and your caretaker are the student. You and your parents. That's a tag team, Jesse. That's a team! Nobody wins alone in this country, and certainly nobody wins alone in a hearing room.

Jesse

It's a tag team, sure. Gino and I never would've worked if one of us had to call the whole match solo. Now, Ryan's other big image is the Windows XP Task Manager, and I think it's the sharpest thing he says. Your heartbeat, your blinking, your lungs, your senses, your shoulder pain, all of that is running in the background before anyone hands you a form. Then the institution piles expectations on top and wonders why the machine is bogged down.

Donna Trump

Because it's Windows XP, Jesse! Beautiful system, a classic, and they want it running forty programs and a spreadsheet and a hearing! And Ryan brings up the two percent. Only about two percent of people can multitask without a drop in performance. Is that real? That one's real.

Jesse

It is real, with the numbers tightened up. Watson and Strayer published it in 2010. Two hundred people in a driving simulator, also doing memory and math tasks over a phone, and about two and a half percent showed no drop at all. Strayer has also said most of us overrate how well we multitask. The better people think they are, the worse they tend to do. So Ryan struggling to juggle a pile of demands isn't a character flaw. It's the normal human setting. The forty percent brain capacity number he mentions, though, we can't back up, so I'd leave that one on the shelf. The big point stands without it.

Donna Trump

The big point stands! Now, the harder part, and we do this with respect. Ryan talks about the Ouija board and the UFO story that he says has run since 1998, every day, no break. We're not going to sit here and argue about the story, Ryan. That's not the fight. The fight is what it does to you. What we hear is a mind that never gets to clock out. Constant questions, no answers, no stop. Anybody would be fried. And he says it himself, you can only take so much of it before you're burned out.

Jesse

And when he jokes that the Ouija board and Chat Avenue and the rocking chair are his marriage, I laughed, and then I didn't. Because a marriage you can't walk out of, one that follows you into the bathroom, is just a loop. We'd call it runaway mental processing, an exhausted mind spinning its wheels. And you're allowed to want off that treadmill. I think we said something like that to you before, and I'm glad you heard it.

Donna Trump

And he heard it! This is the part that made me stand up. Ryan says therapy works, and he names names. Cody, Julie, Duncan, Carla. Four people, four wins. Cody told him it sounds like he had to teach himself something. That's a clinician noticing that this man has been doing the job alone for years.

Jesse

Julie from Human Supports described a bully trying to take over his mind. I like that, because it separates the person from the pressure. Duncan took twenty six seconds, Ryan says, to see that a student was scared because he kept getting shuttled between a familiar classroom and an unknown one, back and forth, all day. And Carla said it's normal for a worn out mind to want to go back to a time when it felt less stressed, less hurt, less confused. That's not weakness. That's a mind looking for a place to sit down.

Donna Trump

Looking for a place to sit down, I love it. And Ryan's conclusion is right. It's way too hard to evaluate yourself from inside the loop. You need somebody outside with a clear head giving you feedback. That's not failing. That's smart. That's a strong move. Get the feedback, get the outside view, keep going back.

Jesse

And then the number that put everything in perspective for me. Eighteen months of sleep deprivation. Four to five hours a night, with Zyprexa and Seroquel in the mix and a sore shoulder on top. Eighteen months of that is a long fucking time, like he says. Of course the mind is spinning. Anybody's would. So when he reports that he slept on his side yesterday and had a little more energy today, that's not a small thing. That's a real data point.

Donna Trump

Sleep on the side, win the day! It's simple, and simple works. Tell Cody, tell the doctors about the sleep, about the shoulder, about all of it. Let the people who know the medications weigh in on the medications. Bring an advocate to the housing authority, because he's right, he shouldn't walk in alone. And pace yourself, Ryan. Social emotional learning is new for you, and you called yourself a beginner. Good. Beginners improve fast.

Jesse

He also said he's still pissed off about gaslighting, and that nobody has mastered their emotions. Right. Nobody gets a diploma for that. Being angry at a school system that handed you a goose egg for years of effort isn't a malfunction. It's a reasonable response. The work now is making sure the person who earned all that credit gets some rest.

Donna Trump

Some rest! Give that man all the credit and a good pillow. You busted your ass, Ryan, and it counts. It counts! Sleep on your side, call your people, and we'll be right here.