One of the best traits about me is that retarded people love me. (I know that isn’t the correct term but I wrote a blog about shitting my pants yesterday I get a little leeway.)
Growing up back in New York we had a janitor at our middle school that had downs syndrome. He had to walk by my house everyday on his way home from work. Almost everyday we could cross paths as I was headed home from whatever sports practice I had. Everyday Mark and I would talk for a second, usually ending up with Mark giving me a hug. He was probably in his twenties and really was just an all around nice guy. When summer rolled around and he still worked he would still stop outside my house and scream for me to see if I was home. Most of the time I was not but he always told my mother to tell me he said hi.
I thought nothing of it at the time but that was always a bright spot in my day. You know Mark was never going to be sad or upset. He always kept plugging along trying to make new friends. (Sadly when I moved away for a few years Mark passed away. It still kind of bugs me that I wasn’t living in NY at the time to go to his funeral.)
It’s been sometime since I regularly have dealt with people that are differently-abled (see retarded is so much easier to type out). So I think my radar might be a little off. Today I was sitting in the main eating area on campus in between classes reading a newspaper and eating dinner waiting for my night class to start. One of the workers was cleaning up and came up to me. He saw that I was reading the sports page and began to ask questions about a picture in the newspaper. To me he seemed like he was slightly retarded, he spoke like someone with downs, I engaged him in conversation explaining that the picture was of a high school football coach.
He then asked me about Washington St versus Auburn this weekend. I told him I thought Auburn was probably going to beat them pretty good. He informed me that he was from Washington and liked that team. I got his rundown of the running back and quarterback it took him a few minutes to think of their names. Patiently I sat there while he stammered their names out. My new friend went and changed out the garbage and came back to start talking to me. He told me that he felt that Washington St had a great team and they should beat Auburn. At this point I was humoring him and not debating, so I went along. I didn’t want to upset him and have him unleash retard rage on me.
Then a conversation took a total turn for the weird. This was the monologue he unleashed on me.
Yeah I went to Washington St. You think they can drink down here it is nothing like up there. I once drank a case in an hour. Then eight hours later I drank a bottle of jack. And the weed man, the weed, just unbelievable up there. I smoked way to much up there I don’t do it anymore.
He then kind of moseyed away. The guy didn’t have downs he just had drank and smoked way too much weed to make himself retarded. I guess there is such a thing as too much.
Lesson learned: Washington St either has the lowest academic standards on the face of the earth or you can totally smoke to much weed and drink too much alcohol. Also I can not only not judge age but I can’t tell if people are retarded or not.
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