Monday – Look At Us! No Wonder!
Nov. 22nd, 2010 09:40 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ninanevermore.
.
.
Tomorrow morning my husband and I will be interviewed by the school therapists who are assessing our son. This is the last little get together we all get to have before the ARD meeting (what IEP meetings are called here in Texas) in early December.
“I say we douse ourselves in alcohol on us before we go. And I’ll put makeup around my eyes like they’re bruised. Then we stumble in there and pretend to fight the whole time. Then they can go, aha! No wonder the kid’s a wreck!”
“You mean splash vodka all over us? That’s an idea.”
“Yeah, like it was cologne. Make their eyebrows go right up when we walk in.”
Jeff thought for a moment. “We probably shouldn’t, though.”
“It was kind of evil for me to even think that, huh?”
“Pretty much, yeah.”
“Fine. We’ll act all responsible and respectable. Be that way.”
The truth is, I do take all of this seriously. I know it’s important. But I have to make fun of things and laugh; it’s something I do to cope. One of my most profound memories is standing around cracking jokes with my cousins before my mother’s funeral when I was 15. I cried all through the service that day, but jokes and merriment were bookends to the before and after of the funeral. I’m quite comfortable with gallows humor.
I worked through my lunch today, and will work though it tomorrow and the next day, as well, to make up the time. My new boss is understanding.
“Don’t worry about it,” she told me, “Both my kids had IEDs. My daughter is dyslexic, and my son has some kind of focusing problem. I mean, he’s studying engineering now and he’s fine, but he used it to get extra time for his tests and stuff like that when he needed it. It’s a good thing to have; it protects them.”
Her understanding and acceptance was a relief to hear. It was so much better than Mike at my old job raising his eyes when I had to take a call in the middle of the work day to talk to the school psychologist. As luck would have it, she called during one of the few occasions he was actually talking to me, as opposed to ignoring me like he did most of the time. I had to take the call at first because I only knew it was from the school, and after my son’s first outburst there I never knew when it might be another emergency. Once the shrink has me on the phone, I had to talk to her because I was so desperate for answers. I apologized to Mike, and told him it was the psychologist from my son’s elementary school.
His eyebrows went up and he looked skeptical. “His elementary school has a psychologist?”
“Yes, and I need to talk to her. I’m sorry.” The next thing I knew, I was giving job candidates directions to the office so they could interview for my position.
I’m making more money now, have a nicer drive, and work with a whole office full of really nice people. Not to mention all the free sample sizes of chicken dishes I can eat at lunch time, provided I’m willing to circle the whole mall food court. Chicken teriyaki, orange chicken, bourbon chicken, more orange chicken, Chick Fil A chicken, chicken Santa Fe wraps, grilled chicken sandwiches, more orange chicken, and sweet and sour chicken, all served up nugget sized on toothpicks. I am making nine thousand dollars more a year, and I get my lunches for free. Really, Mike did me a huge favor. I need so send him a thank you card.
I don’t know what to expect tomorrow, or what to expect at the meeting in December. We’ll see. Regardless, I have plenty to be thankful for this week of Thanksgiving: a new job, perhaps some answers about my son (or at the very least, some more focused questions), and a well developed sense of gallows humor to get me thought it all. I’ll keep all this in mind over at Jeff’s brother’s house this Thursday, where his German wife will no doubt serve up bratwursts and carrot salads (because that’s what she likes).
So it goes.
* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * # * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *
.
.
Tomorrow morning my husband and I will be interviewed by the school therapists who are assessing our son. This is the last little get together we all get to have before the ARD meeting (what IEP meetings are called here in Texas) in early December.
“I say we douse ourselves in alcohol on us before we go. And I’ll put makeup around my eyes like they’re bruised. Then we stumble in there and pretend to fight the whole time. Then they can go, aha! No wonder the kid’s a wreck!”
“You mean splash vodka all over us? That’s an idea.”
“Yeah, like it was cologne. Make their eyebrows go right up when we walk in.”
Jeff thought for a moment. “We probably shouldn’t, though.”
“It was kind of evil for me to even think that, huh?”
“Pretty much, yeah.”
“Fine. We’ll act all responsible and respectable. Be that way.”
The truth is, I do take all of this seriously. I know it’s important. But I have to make fun of things and laugh; it’s something I do to cope. One of my most profound memories is standing around cracking jokes with my cousins before my mother’s funeral when I was 15. I cried all through the service that day, but jokes and merriment were bookends to the before and after of the funeral. I’m quite comfortable with gallows humor.
I worked through my lunch today, and will work though it tomorrow and the next day, as well, to make up the time. My new boss is understanding.
“Don’t worry about it,” she told me, “Both my kids had IEDs. My daughter is dyslexic, and my son has some kind of focusing problem. I mean, he’s studying engineering now and he’s fine, but he used it to get extra time for his tests and stuff like that when he needed it. It’s a good thing to have; it protects them.”
Her understanding and acceptance was a relief to hear. It was so much better than Mike at my old job raising his eyes when I had to take a call in the middle of the work day to talk to the school psychologist. As luck would have it, she called during one of the few occasions he was actually talking to me, as opposed to ignoring me like he did most of the time. I had to take the call at first because I only knew it was from the school, and after my son’s first outburst there I never knew when it might be another emergency. Once the shrink has me on the phone, I had to talk to her because I was so desperate for answers. I apologized to Mike, and told him it was the psychologist from my son’s elementary school.
His eyebrows went up and he looked skeptical. “His elementary school has a psychologist?”
“Yes, and I need to talk to her. I’m sorry.” The next thing I knew, I was giving job candidates directions to the office so they could interview for my position.
I’m making more money now, have a nicer drive, and work with a whole office full of really nice people. Not to mention all the free sample sizes of chicken dishes I can eat at lunch time, provided I’m willing to circle the whole mall food court. Chicken teriyaki, orange chicken, bourbon chicken, more orange chicken, Chick Fil A chicken, chicken Santa Fe wraps, grilled chicken sandwiches, more orange chicken, and sweet and sour chicken, all served up nugget sized on toothpicks. I am making nine thousand dollars more a year, and I get my lunches for free. Really, Mike did me a huge favor. I need so send him a thank you card.
I don’t know what to expect tomorrow, or what to expect at the meeting in December. We’ll see. Regardless, I have plenty to be thankful for this week of Thanksgiving: a new job, perhaps some answers about my son (or at the very least, some more focused questions), and a well developed sense of gallows humor to get me thought it all. I’ll keep all this in mind over at Jeff’s brother’s house this Thursday, where his German wife will no doubt serve up bratwursts and carrot salads (because that’s what she likes).
So it goes.
