It was our normal house recreation hour and this afternoon we took the kids down to the basketball courts for a game. We had all the kids except the new kid, James, who was in therapy; and the staff was me, Mel, Trixie, Gus (who was up at the house getting dinner ready) and Vance, a new staff that has been with us for about 6 weeks.

Now I really like this new guy, Vance. You could tell right away that he has a good head on his shoulders. He is in college studying to become a teacher, an athletic Philipino guy who has a good sense of humor and has a nice, positive energy with the kids. The nice thing about him is that he sets firm limits and doesn’t let the kids get away with too much. I can tell he’ll be here for a while and I’ve tried my best to take him under my wing and help him out when he’s got questions or needs to understand “the big picture.” And there are always plenty of “teachable moments” when you’re dealing with these kids. Like a lot of new staff, he can be a little too exhuberant sometimes, trying to do too much.

You can probably imagine that trying to play a regular game of basketball with a group of severely emotionally disturbed boys is no walk in the park. Even in play, you’re still working. Typically, any kind of game consists of about a minute of playing and then 5 more minutes of behavior modification and calming down hot tempers. This particular “game” included the boys taking turns standing at the top of the key with the ball, screaming out “Jordan!” or “Iverson!” or “Shaq Diesel!” or “Skills!” and then charging toward the basket as if to dunk and knocking down anyone standing around playing “defense.” It resembled human bowling more than anything.

After being leveled a few times, Francis had finally had enough.

“I ain’t playing no more!” he screamed. “Fuck all y’all bitches!” He stomped off the court, up the hill and toward the trees.

Trixie said, “Hey Francis, just take a break, get some water or something. We can go play one-on-one together and work on your skills.”

“I ain’t doing shit, you bitch-ass ho! I’m climbing trees instead. I ain’t coming down, neither.”

Trixie was unimpressed. “Okay, whatever. Don’t fall out.”

“I hope I do!”

The staff then turned their attention to the remaining participating boys. All the staff except Vance, who, with a head full of steam shouted, “I’ll get him!” And ran up the hill. As he did so, Francis quickly jumped up, grabbed a limb, climbed up the tree and sat on a branch.

I called out to Vance, “Hey, easy there big boy! Just keep an eye on him, he’s not going anywhere!”

Francis picked off a few pine cones and began to throw them in Vance’s general direction.

“These are bitch-bombs, muthafuckin retard!”

“Gotta get him!” said Vance. He turned to Francis. “Get down!” Francis ripped off a pine cone and chucked it at Vance. I started to walk up the hill to help out the new guy.

“Vance,” I said, “slow down. He’s not going anywhere. Where’s he gonna go? Just get out of pine cone range and keep an eye on him. He wants you to engage his negative attention-seeking…”

Another pine cone went whizzing by Vance’s head.

“Oh yeah?” said Vance, “I got something for that!” Vance took a running jump, vaulted off the tree trunk, grabbed Francis by the ankle and yanked him out of the tree. They both landed with a thud on the ground, Francis landing on his back. Vance wrestled Francis on the ground trying to pin him down, all the while Francis was yelling, “Abuse! Staff abuse! I’m telling my therapist! He’s trying to break my arm!”

As I walked up to the two, Vance knelt down on Francis’ back, pinning him there. “Now what, Francis? That’s what you get for trying to hit me. Now you know…”

“Wow, what an incredible display of childcare skills,” I said. “You know Vance, far be it from me to try to criticize, but I was just wondering what you were going to put in the Incident Report. I hope you’re studying creative writing in school.”

Vance looked up at me. “What’s an Incident Report?”

I rolled my eyes and rubbed my forehead. “Goddamn it, not again. Are you serious? Please don’t tell me they let another one work in the most violent unit on campus and they haven’t PART trained you.”

“PART training? What’s that?”

“You’re really trying to get me fired aren’t you?” I knelt down next to Vance. “Here, put your leg over his leg like this, pull out his arm and hold on to it above the wrist. Don’t kneel on him. You want to immobilize him without hurting him. It’s not a fight.”

“But I’m just doing what you guys always do,” said Vance.

“Well, no you’re not. You’ve got to go through PART training to put your hands on a kid, and you always have to do it with another staff, not alone. And the kid has to be seriously violent. So, since I’m the senior staff here, and PART trained at that, I have to write the fucking IR and I have no idea what I’m going to write.”

Francis continued, “The goddamn newcomber is an abuser! He pushed me outta the tree and I wasn’t doing shit! Call the sheriff, call the sheriff!” He was trying to turn his head around to spit on Vance.

I said, “Now Francis, you know he didn’t run up and yank you out of the tree. What Vance and I are going to do now that we’ve PART captured you and PART restrained you together is this: we’re going to safely PART escort you up the hill into the house where we will then PART place you into the Quiet Room.

“I ain’t goin to no fuckin Quiet Room! I didn’t do nothing and this fat-assed ho slammed me down for no reason. I’m calling my lawyer and get his stupid fuckin ass fired!! Newcomber’s smokin crack!”

Vance and I picked him up off the ground and dragged him up the hill. Francis continued to spit in Vance’s direction. When he did, we would stop, and still holding his upper arms, use our free hands to push his head down, which would cause Francis to scream.

I said, “Now Francis, every time you try to create a dangerous situation by trying to assault the staff, we are required to PART keep ourselves safe by PART protecting ourselves from your abusive spit. That means shoving your head down as close to the ground as possible while still holding your arms way up here. Sorry if it’s a little uncomfortable. So if you want us to stop PART shoving your head down, stop spitting.”

“I’m gonna spit on you then I’m gonna sock the shit out of you.”

We finally arrived at the Quiet Room door. Both Vance and I had Francis’ upper arms and as we pushed him toward the open door, Francis would reach out and hold onto the edge of the door to prevent us from getting him in there.

I said, “Now Francis, for your protection and for ours, I’m going to have to safely PART deposit you into this room.” I turned to Vance and quickly said, “Ok, let go.”

As Vance let go, Francis instantly tried to turn and punch him with his free arm. Anticipating this, and still holding his other arm, I simultaneously spun him around and shoved him into the room using his spinning as momentum. Francis twirled around about 3 times before falling down on the floor. I slammed the door and turned to Vance.

“I call that the ‘helicopter.’ I don’t know if PART has a name for it. Can you go get me two incident reports? I’ll show you how to write one.”

As Vance went to get the IR’s, Francis continued, “I’m gonna bust outta here and get my paybacks! I’m gonna beat that newcomber’s ass!” He repeatedly ran full speed at the door and slammed into it.
I said, “Now Francis, if you continue to try to hurt yourself, Vance and I will be required to keep you safe by PART coming in there and PART floor containing you. And it’s a long way down to the floor.”

“Fuck PART!”

Vance returned, IR’s in hand.

“Thanks,” I said. “Now tell me exactly what happened.”

Vance said, “Well, Francis’ stupid ass ran up a tree…”

“I heard that! He called me stupid! That’s it! What’s the number for 911, I’m calling the cops!”

“…and I yanked his ass outta there.”

I said, “Oh, Grasshopper, you have a great deal to learn from me, the Great Master. You definitely did not ‘yank his ass outta there.’ We don’t do illegal things here. We do things per PART, because every last one of us is PART trained, right?”

“Well I’m not PART trained. Can Francis really get us fired for this? He keeps talking about that.”

“Well, actually both you and I could concievably get fired, yes. But Francis has a major hurdle to jump, which is this: he has to tell a story that makes sense. Luckily for us, we have logic and reason on our side. Observe.” I turned to the Quiet Room’s window and yelled to Francis.

“Hey Francis!”

“What the hell do you want, you asshole?”

“I just have a question. When Vance here was nice enough to come to the tree and talk to you about being upset during the game, why did you try to kick him?”

“Cuz he’s a punk-ass bitch! Wait. Did I do that? I didn’t do that! He tried to hit me. That’s when I socked his ass. Fuckin newcomber!” He paused a moment. “Stokie I’m gonna fuck you up cuz you’re trying to confuse me.”

“I am not,” I said. “I’m trying to PART talk about your feelings and PART process you out of this dangerous situation.”

Francis was indignant. “Talk about my feelings? Riiiiight! I FEEL like I’m going to fuck up the newcomber’s car. I FEEL like his fat-ho mama likes to eat shit. I FEEL like my back hurts where that damn nigga SLAMMED ME DOWN FOR NO FUCKIN REASON!!”

“That’s nice, Francis,” I said. “I’m glad you’ve decided to calm down.” I turned to Vance. “Dude, you have to show that he made an immediate threat to his or our safety. And you have to show that you made an effort to calm him down and that you warned him of consequences.”

“So,” I continued. “What I have so far is that you gave him a timeout from the game so that he could calm down. He refused his timeout and threatened to punch you. After you repeatedly warned him about his unsafe behavior, he ran up a tree and threatened to jump out. Concerned for his safety, you and I followed him up there, he started throwing pine cones, lost his balance and fell on you as you tried to break his fall. After he started trying to punch you, we placed him in a PART prone containment. How’s that so far?”

Vance squirmed. “Doesn’t it bother you that you’re sorta faking the information? I mean it’s kinda true, but it’s kinda not.”

I said, “I’ll tell you what makes me uncomfortable. I’m uncomfortable with an Administration that let’s new staff come into this unit without being PART trained and having the audacity to not tell anyone about it. I think that’s a direct threat to my job.”

Vance said, “Oh. Then that’s exactly how I remember it, oh Great Master.”

Francis screamed, “I remember ABUSE!” Get Johnny Cochran on the phone! I’m telling and your abusive asses are getting fired!”

I said, “Now here’s the good part. Give me that extra IR.”

I opened the door a crack and tossed in the IR.

“Francis,” I said. “I’m very concerned about these allegations of abuse and I want you to know that I’m on your side.”

“No you’re not, Stokie! You’re using your powers for EVIL!”

I continued, “So I want you to write your side of the story on that IR so that all the lawyers and therapists and house supervisors can look at it and fire Vance’s stupid ass. Can you do that for me?”

Vance turned pale and looked at me as if I had abandoned him.

Francis picked up the IR. “Fuck yeah, dude, now it’s time for payback. I’m gonna write the sheriff, too. How do you spell ’stupid-ass retard’? How do you spell ‘crack smokin white-ass honky’? How do you spell ‘the newcomber looks like William Hung’?

Francis then took the IR and ripped it up into tiny pieces. “I ain’t writing shit for you, muthafucka! You can’t make me!”

“Dang, Francis,” I said. “You always figure out a way to outsmart me.” I turned to Vance. “Now I write, ‘When given the opportunity to write down his complaints of abuse, the resident ripped up the IR and refused.’ And that’s that.”

Just then James, the MC of Doo-kie, burst into the front door with his therapist, Martin. James was a whirlwind of energy and lack of impulse control. He was quickly running from the kitchen to his room and to the tv.

He was saying, “I’m gonna play my Gameboy fo a minute. I want a snack first. What’s on tv? I’m gonna put on my new clothes. What’s for dinner? I’m goin’ down to the courts…”

All the while Martin was closely following him, half jogging, chanting, “Control…control…control…Remember what we were talking about? Control…control…control….”

I heard Mel say from the kitchen, “Get out of my kitchen and get in the shower. Therapy’s over.”

“I’m just gonna play my Gameboy, but first I’m gonna play Legos…”

“Control…control…control…”

I called out, “I heard Mel say get in the shower. Now get in the shower.”

James continued, “Can me and Martin do magic tricks? First I wanna go shoot some hoops…”

“Control…control…”

I called out again, “James, get in the shower right now or you’re going to bed early and you’re not getting any dessert. Five, four, three, two…”

“Okay, okay, Stokie, damn!” He ran to get a change of clothes, went to the bathroom, slammed the door and turned on the shower. Martin then approached me.

“You know Stokie,” he said, “I don’t appreciate your threatening him to get him in the shower. He and I are working on his impulse control.”

I said, “Martin, when he’s in therapy you guys can play ‘follow the leader’ or whatever other game you want. I’m sure it’s very theraputic. But when he comes back up here, he’s gotta follow the house rules and I can’t have two out-of-control people running around my house when I’m trying to run a shift. I got the rest of the house coming up from rec, I got a kid in the Quiet Room. I don’t need you two to add to the chaos.”

Martin turned on his heels and left.

I turned back to Vance. “Hey, by the way, how’s it going with Stephanie? You were talking about maybe asking her out or whatever and I know you two had that evening shift together the other day. She’s got that nice, big boo-tay.”

Francis burst out, “You said big booty! Stop talking about my mama!”

“Francis,” I said. “If you can prove to me that you’re no longer violent, you can come out and join the rest of the house with no consequences. Sit down and be quiet for 5 minutes.”

“Fine, bitch.” Francis sat down.

Vance said, “Oh yeah! We totally hooked up during my overnight.”

“Already? Jeez dude, you work fast.”

“Yeah, once the Night Awake came on shift, I asked her if she wanted to watch a dvd with me in the staff office, we both sat down on the bed and one thing led to another.” He smiled.

“Wow, buddy, you’re a real Cassanova. That must’ve been some dvd to get her in the mood. What’d you do, go rent something special just in case?”

“No man,” he said. “I just put on one of the house’s dvd’s. Just a little something for ambience. You know.”

I was incredulous. “No you didn’t. We don’t have anything like that here. What was it?”

“‘Finding Nemo’.

I stared at him as my jaw slowly dropped. “Well, I guess the Great Master can still learn some new things from the Grasshopper.”

I pulled into the parking lot at 6am ready to start my shift as usual. It was Tuesday morning, so that means we’ll have staff meeting after we’ve gotten the boys up and off to school. So my mind set was on getting the boys up in a positive frame of mind so that we don’t have any up at the house to distract us during the meeting, and also on doing a quick cleaning job so that whatever admin staff comes up to join us, as well as any random social workers or lawyers won’t think we’re running an institutional pig sty.

I also like Tuesday mornings because I work with my buddy Mel, the next most senior staff member on the team. Mel has been around for about 3 years and is fun and easy to work with. Although I’d been here now for 11 years, it’s still refreshing to start a shift with someone who has more than a few months’ experience. He sets clear limits but also is able to enjoy himself around the kids and has a great sense of humor. So I was thinking that this would be a nice, easy morning.

Then I saw our house supervisor, Yolanda’s car in front of the house. Damn! She’s not supposed to be in until 8. The only reason she’d be here is because something is wrong. Maybe a kid needs to be hospitalized. Maybe Mel called in sick.

I walked in the house and was greeted by both Yolanda and Mel.
“What happened this time?” I asked.
“I just wanted to talk to you and Mel before the shift got started,” said Yolanda. “It’s important.”
Aww, man. What did I do this time? I wondered. As we walked into her office, I quickly ran down any events of the last week that she might want to confront us about. Was it about sticking a push pin into the Quiet Room lock so that it sticks in the locked position? I really needed to walk out into the kitchen and eat my dinner while Brian was blowing out because he didn’t like his mom’s new girlfriend. Was it about giving fat-ass Rusty a plate of grapes for dinner while everyone else ate lasagna? Is it because I told Freddy, the sexual predator that his therapist, Sam was a “fucking moron” for letting Freddy bring up Macy’s underwear ads to the house so that Freddy might “relieve all the pressure?” Whatever it was, I was in no mood to come up with creative explanations before I’ve had my coffee.
We all took a seat in Yolanda’s office.
“I just wanted to talk to you guys before the day got going because you two are my most experienced staff and I need your help. You worked with that new Japanese chick yesterday, right? The one who did her observation, Myako? What did you think about her?”

I said, “Yeah, she was pretty meek. She’s obviously one of those career students who thinks this experience will look good on her resume while she goes after her Master’s. Completely misplaced. Maybe she’d do well with really young kids, but not here. Just the language barrier alone is enough to keep her from understanding what’s going on here.”
Mel piped in, “Oh, fo’ sho’. On top of that, didn’t nobody could understand what the fuck she be sayin’.”
‘That’s what I thought too,” said Yolanda. “But now we got Pete Post’s stupid ass advocating for her to work here. He says we get some kind of state credit for having someone with a Master’s degree working here and he won’t listen to me when I tell him she’s gonna wind up getting hurt, or getting someone else hurt. Plus, I’m not gonna go outta my way to change everything for her cuz she got some kind of ‘chemical sensitivity.’ Bitch has some kind of allergic reaction to chemicals and I ain’t gonna change the way we clean the house just because of her. We gonna just have to change back soon as she quits anyways. I’m sick and tired of Pete Post trying to override everything cuz he got some kinda crush on some Asian bitch.”
I was perplexed. “But…I thought he was doing Janette Stankin.”
“He still is. But you know how you white boys are about Asian chicks.”
“Right you are, Yolanda. I almost went against my own race.”
Yolanda said, “Anyway, Pete Post fuckin went and hired her on the spot yesterday after her observation. She comes in this morning at 6:30”
Mel was incredulous. “The fuck? What? Hired her for our house? Aww, hell no!”
I just shook my head. “Dude…”
“That’s why I want to talk to you two,” said Yolanda. “I’m not saying to do nothing abusive, but you know it’s not easy for new people to fit right in. I want her to know that she’s new, this is a hard job, and she’s not gonna fit right in, if ever. Know what I’m saying?”
Mel and I looked at each other. We looked at Yolanda. We understood.
Yolanda got up to leave. “Now I’m not saying for you to be abusive…” She left the room.
“Damn!” said Mel. I didn’t never think I’d see Yolanda that upset. Guess I better start cleaning the house.”
I nodded. “You know Pete Post doesn’t know shit about support. I think once you get promoted to Admin, they stick a ‘Fuck Your Staff’ chip in your neck and let you run wild. I better get up Brian so he can work off some of those work detail consequences he earned last night.”

While Mel went into the laundry room to mix up what I’m sure was going to be a potent cleansing potion, I went to Brian’s room to wake him up. He earned some work details overnight because the Night Awake caught him trying to crawl into the kitchen and steal some Pop-Tarts.

“Brian, wake up. I want you to get these work details done before you go to school. Time’s a-wasting, let’s go.”

“Can I please just have another 10 minutes or so? I’m tired,” he whined.

“No way, dude, if you had gone to bed when you were supposed to you woulda had plenty of sleep. Instead, you wanted to run around and play Pop-Tart Commando. Get up.”

“Please, Stokie? I’ll do the work details later.”

“Remember when I said ‘No’? Now get up.”

Brian reluctantly slithered out of bed and washed his face. He approached me with unkempt hair, bleary eyes and he was scratching his ass.

“What do you want me to do?” he asked.

I said, “Mel is in the laundry room making some mop water. Go get it, mop all the bathrooms and showers, the hallways, the kitchen, dining room and laundry room. Do a good job, not a half-ass-I-mean-hearted job and you might be done after that. Check in with me when you’re done.”

Brian liked it when I cussed and pretended not to and said, “Okay Stokie, thanks.”

I walked through the other boys’ rooms and got them up. I could hear Brian from the laundry room, “Jeez, Mel, what’d you put in here? This mop water is hecka-strong!”

“Hee-hee-hee,” came Mel’s voice from somewhere across the house.

As I suspected, Brian slopped mop water all over the floor as he struggled to control the mop bucket and bring it to the places I told him to mop. He dutifully followed directions and wiped mop water all over the designated floors and bathrooms. When he was done he said, “Stokie, do you think we should open a window?”

I said, “What for? That’s a nice pine scent. That’s what we’re shooting for.” At that moment, Miyako walked in the house.

I said, “I’m gonna give Miyako a crossover then you can check in with her for the rest of your work details.”

This irritated Brian. “What? You said I’d be done after I mopped! Aww, man!”

As I walked up to Miyako, I noticed that her eyes were watery. I thought the chemicals in the water were awfully strong, too.

“Hi Miyako. Brian here has just one more work detail to do. Can you tell him to set the table and put out the cereal and milk? I have to go drop the kids off at the pool.”

As I walked toward the staff office I heard Miyako ask Brian, “The pool? Before breakfast?”

Brian started up immediately with his patented sassy attitude. We called it ‘throwin’ out the sass’. “He means he’s gonna go take a dump. You newcumbers don’t understand anything.”

I walked into the staff office, shut the door behind me, but opened it just a crack so Mel and I could watch what would happen next. We were giggling like a couple of school kids.

Miyako said to Brian, “Umm, ok, so… Can you set the table and put cereal and milk on the table?”

“Nope. Stokie said I was done with my work details, so I don’t have to.”

“He told me you have to set the table and put cereal and milk on the table so you better do that.”

“Oh, ok. Fine,” Brian said as he walked into the kitchen and opened up the refridgerator. “You want me to put milk on the table? Then I WILL GODDAMMIT!”

Brian grabbed the gallon of milk in the fridge, opened it and shook it upsidedown onto the table. “There! See that? Think you’re so smart? Look, I’m putting milk on the table because the newcumber told me too…”

Miyako, obviously didn’t know what to do. She was looking around for help, stumbling over her words and panicky. I walked out of the staff office and feigned shock.

“Oh my God, Miyako! What did you do? All he had to do was set the table! I can’t believe it Miyako, if you weren’t sure, you should have asked.”

I turned to Brian, “Into the Quiet Room.”

I turned back to Miyako, “Me and Mel are gonna take Brian to the Quiet Room because he’s violent. Can you clean up this mess? The mop bucket is in the laundry room. Then after that you’re gonna have to write an incident report.”

As Mel and I walked Brian across the house, I asked him, “Brian, why did you do that?”

“I always do that to damn newcumbers. They don’t understand shit.”

I spent about 5 minutes with Brian in the Quiet Room. I never had to shut the door and lock him in it because he was pretty calm. I said, “Well Brian, I think you should apologize to Miyako. I have to get the other kids ready for school.”

Brian, unwilling to relinquish this valuable one-on-one time said, “No way, she should apologize to me.”

“Well, I’ll go get her so you can apologize anyway.”

I walked out and called Miyako, “Hey, can you come here and sit with Brian for a while? He wants to apologize. Thanks.” She came over and had a seat next to Brian. As I left, they were just sitting, staring at each other silently.

Mel and I went about our business of helping the kids get up and eat breakfast. I noticed my eyes were burning and I could practically taste the chemicals in the air. “Damn Mel, one of these days you’re gonna have to give me the recipe for that mop water.”

“Little bit of this, little bit of that,” said Mel. I opened up all the windows. This was getting painful, even for me.

By now, most of the kids were ready for school and I decided to check on Brian and Miyako, since I hadn’t heard anything in a while. I rounded the corner to the Quiet Room and was surprised to see Brian and Miyako sitting in the same positions facing each other, still quiet, only this time, Brian was casually, yet continuously spitting on Miyako. Now I’m all for hazing, but this was way too much.

“Oh hell no, Brian!” I walked up past Miyako, picked up Brian and shoved him into the Quiet Room and locked the door. “Miyako! You need to call for help when something like that happens! Go to the staff office bathroom and get cleaned up.” She scampered off. Mel poked his head in to see what was going on.

“Dude, this is worse than I thought,” I said. “Don’t do anything else, she really doesn’t have a clue.” I was feeling pretty bad that we had taken Yolanda’s bait. I felt like a pawn in someone else’s battle. But this day was just beginning.

I didn’t really think about my intervention with Brian and Miyako after that. There was a staff meeting to get prepared for, kids to be taken to school and a house to get cleaned up. I told Mel that I would drive the kids down to school, he would get the last bits of the house cleaned up, and Miyako? I told Miyako that she could work on her incident report regarding Brian.

As for me, I liked to take my time getting back to the house after I dropped the kids off at school, and for a couple of reasons. Many of the school staff are my old friends. Most of them used to be counselors just like me but got sick of the low pay and administrative bullshit that goes with this job. (Little did they know that the School Counselor’s job came with its own brand of low pay and bullshit.) The fact of the matter is, there is an “us against them” mentality that affects both staffs.

It goes like this:

The House staff knows best because we are on the front lines and are experts on the kids’behavior. We know all their interpersonal dynamics, from peer interaction to family abuse. What these kids really need is tough behavior modification because nobody ever took the time to teach these kids discipline.

vs.

The School staff knows best because they are on the front lines of the kids’ educational development. Kids’ misbehavior can be traced to obvious learning disabilities. What these kids really need are chances, because nobody ever gave them one when they really needed it.

I have seen many House staff switch jobs and seemingly overnight, treat me like I was the enemy, like my ideas were crazy. I have also seen School staff come and work up at the houses and behave similarly to their ex-mates. The truth is, the Administrative staffs of both organizations hold each other in contempt. This attitude naturally trickles down to the front line staff who take it out on each other. I like to hang around the School staff for a while to get a sense of what is going on down at the school, what the staff are thinking and doing with the kids.

As I walked the kids to their classrooms, I spent a couple of minutes checking in with the teachers and the teachers’ aides before I walked on down to the counselor’s office. By the time I got there, fat-ass Rusty was already in trouble, huffing and puffing about some injustice his teacher had perpetrated against him. He was talking to Jamaal, an ex-counselor who had about as much experience as me, someone I respect, and a guy who also sees that so much of our jobs rest on the exercise of ridiculousness.

Jamaal says to Rusty, “Now Rusty, just because your teacher is a fucking bitch doesn’t mean you can’t stay in school.”

“Well that’s what she is, and she knows it,” puffs Rusty.

“Well, yeah, she definitely knows it now that you screamed it to her in class…”

“Oh no! You’re definitely coming back up to the house and you’re gonna get tons of consequences,” I say, “Let’s go.”

Jamaal winks at me. “Oh my gosh, did you hear that? That’s Stokie Jaye talking, he don’t mess around. You know why? Cuz he’s old and crusty…”

“That’s right, Jamaal knows, too. I was already this way when me and him built this school 30 years ago, back in our hippie days. Jamaal had an afro out to here and I had long hair, a beard and long robe, lotta people mistook me for Jesus, right Jamaal?”

“Mmm, hmm.”

Rusty perked up. “You guys built this school?”

Jamaal said, “In fact, back then Stokie’s rap name was ‘Stokie JJ Hippie Jeeze’ becuase he looked so much like Jesus.”

I said, “But everybody knows Jesus was a black man.”

Jamaal’s cheeks were puffy, suppressing laughter. “I wouldn’t want to be up in the house with him. If I were you, I’d rather apologize to your teacher and stay down here…”

“Here it comes,” I said.

“…Now I’m gonna give you just one more chance…”

I started out the door. “Pleasure doing business with you Mr. Jaye,” said Jamaal.

“As always. Let me know when his thirty last chances run out, I’ll be back down to pick him up.”

By the time I had returned to the house, I was about a half an hour late for the staff meeting. As I entered, I noticed that the chemicals were still really strong, even with the fan on. Around the table sat 5 counselors, the House Supervisor Yolanda, the therapist Sam, and Mel, who was giggling and pointing at Miyako. Miyako held a paper towel over her mouth and nose and was sitting next to the laundry room door, which was slightly open. (I assumed correctly that Mel’s magic potion sat bubbling behind the door.) Also in attendance was Janette Stankin, the Clinical Supervisor. I couldn’t tell which was worse; Mel’s cleaning potion or Janette’s perfume. Whenever she walked into a room, it seemed like you were being smashed over the head with a bottle of Chanel #5. I felt like asking Miyako if I could borrow her paper towel.

Yolanda said to me as I found a seat next to Mel, “Lots of kids in crisis at school, I guess.”

“Oh, always. Lucky thing I was there.”

She said, “Just to catch you up, we were just talking about Michael and some of the frustrations we feel.”

“Oh, okay. Did we already talk about ‘warehousing?’”

My comment hit its target squarely as Janette visibly tensed up.

“Well, no, nobody actually used that term. Maybe there’s something you’d like to say about it?”

I said, “Okay. Well it just seems to me that we’ve done about all we can with Michael. We are not equipped to deal with developmental disabilities; we deal with emotional problems. He needs to go to a facility like the Regional Center that deals with DD. In the mean time, he gets bigger and stronger, has more sex with his peers and assaults more staff. And since he can’t understand our program, we just wind up appeasing him all the time so he doesn’t get mad.” I turned to Janette, “And I guess since his county just keeps paying, we just take the money and store him here, like a warehouse.”

Mel elbowed me, trying to make me laugh at Miyako. Janette was mad at me.

“Stokie, you know very well that we’ve been trying to get Michael to the Regional Center for months. They just won’t take him because he’s not developmentally disabled enough. They just turned down our most recent application. His social worker is happy with the job we’re doing with him and is satisfied that Michael is placed well here.”

I said, “So as long as the county is paying, we’re happy to let him get bigger, have sex and hit people. Okay, I just wanted to be able to tow the company line.”

“You sound so bitter,” said Janette.

“Yup, that’s me, Mr. Bitter. I should probably be more happy about warehousing kids. You know what? I can be happier! Is this a bad time to ask for a raise? I figure with all that money we’re getting from the county, we could all be getting paid more. May my teammates and I please all have raises?”

Janette got up to leave. “Yolanda, thank you for your time and good luck with your staff.”

I turned to my teammates, “Sorry guys, I gave it my all.”

Miyako also got up and quickly shuffled outside for some air. As the meeting broke up, I went in to the laundry room with Mel.

“Mel, what the fuck is in this shit?” Mel was still giggling as he opened the chemical closet.

“Man, I just threw in everything,” he said as he took out bottles of cleaner and put them on the washing machine. “Little of this, little of that.”

I looked at the cleaners. Ajax, Simple Green, bleach, Windex, Pine-Sol, Mr. Clean with ammonia…

My jaw dropped. “Dude! What the fuck is wrong with you? This shit can kill you! Didn’t you read the label?” I realized what a stupid question that was, of course he didn’t read the fucking label. “Mel, dude, if you mix bleach and ammonia it makes a poisonous gas that kills people. For real, it kills people.”

“How the fuck I’m supposed to know that? All the labels are in Spanish.”

“That’s so people’s cleaning ladies don’t die when they clean their house.” I dumped the potion out through the back door. “Course, if you killed Miyako, that woulda made Yolanda’s day. God damn, Mel!”

I came back into the kitchen and there, standing with Miyako, was Pete Post. He had three circle shaped Band-Aids stuck on his face where he shaved over his adult acne.

“Greetings, Stokie. It seems as though there was an intervention this morning which involved you and Brian. Apparently, some questionable techniques were used. I would like you to accompany me so that I may glean some more information.”

As I walked with Pete to the Supervisor’s office, I thought to myself, “If I still have a job when this shit is over, I’m gonna kill that Miyako. This is what I get for trying to help.”

I stepped into Yolanda’s office in front of Miyako and Pete Post, who shut the door behind him. Yolanda was already sitting down.

Pete began, “Stokie, you know that as a veteran staff, the organization values your investment and experience here…”

I said, “That line is always followed by ‘however…’”

“However, from time to time even the veteran staff show signs of stress and make mistakes in their handlings of the kids here. And I’m here to talk to you about this morning and determine if there were any mistakes made and talk to you about whether or not you’re feeling any stress on the job.”

“Well, Pete, I appreciate your concern for my welfare. I don’t remember anything about this morning and I’d have to read Miyako’s incident report to remind myself. May I see it please?”

“Actually, she hasn’t completed it yet. She came to me with it and asked for help with the English. When I helped her write it, she described the incident to me and I became concerned about your handling of the client.”

“So there’s no incident report? I better get to work on it right away. Miyako, why didn’t you just come to me for help on the IR? Why did you go to Pete? After all, I was the one who was there, not Pete.”

Pete squirmed in his chair. “I don’t think that’s the point here…”

Yolanda piped up, “Yeah Miyako. I know I told you when I met you yesterday that you should be checking in with your teammates all the time, especially if you’re confused or have questions. Why didn’t you do that?”

Miyako’s eyes started welling up. “Pete told me that he wanted to know what was going on in the house. He say ‘Tell me if anybody, especially veteran staff like Stokie Jaye do anything might be wrong. So I tell him and he say Stokie might get fired.”

I could have murdered Pete Post right then and there. “So Pete, what I’m hearing is that you’re hiring new staff to be your spies so that you can try to fire veteran staff like me. Do you have any idea how fucked-up that is? You Admin keep talking about supporting us and then you go and do something like this? You all are just talking out of your assholes.”

Pete responded, “I assure you, cursing at me is not going to help you explain any possible illegal behavior.”

“Oh yeah. Miyako, can you remind me what illegal behavior I engaged in?”

Miyako was silent for a moment. Then she burst into tears. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know! Not sure, not sure.”

Pete said, “Miyako, you told me that Stokie picked up Brian by himself and threw him into the Quiet Room. Isn’t that what you saw?”

Miyako said through sobs, “Not sure, not sure.”

Yolanda said, “Sounds like she’s not sure, Pete. And Stokie? Do you remember what happened now?”

“Yes, Yolanda. As I walked toward Brian, he did a backward sommersault into the Quiet Room. I just shut the door because he was being assaultive to Miyako by spitting on her. She just sat there and took it, too.” I turned to Pete, “I wonder where she learned that?”
.
Miyako got up and ran out. This was the last time any of us saw her as she faxed in her letter of resignation the next day.

Yolanda said, “Pete, I think it’s time for you to get out of my office, you aren’t making any friends right now.”

Pete got up to leave and said to me, “There’s too much hands on going on in this house. And another thing, you better think twice before you lie to me again.” With that he left the house.

I got up to leave too. I said to Yolanda, “You need to do your own dirty work. I got Admin stink all over me and almost lost my job for it.”

Every week we hold a staff meeting while the kids are in school to go over each kids’ progress, or lack thereof, and discuss therapeutic strategies so that we can stay on top of each kids’ individual “special needs.”

Mind you, the information we get about the kids’ histories is sometimes heartbreaking and usually tragic. Common themes are sexual, physical and emotional abuse, homelessness, prostitution and drug addiction, i.e., the usual gamut of the white trash and ghetto experience. The boys will often repeat the cycle of abuse or at least act out the antisocial behaviors that they have learned from their upbringing. It is through these meetings that we try to understand these cycles and then decide how best to break them.

It wasn’t a big surprise then, that under a lot of stress Jaques, a 12 year-old of Haitian descent jumped up on a table, pulled out his dick and started waving it around yelling, “Who wants some chocolate milk? Aw yeah, I know you want some of that chocolate milk, now come and get it. How ’bout you, Tyrell, I know you like to fuck boys!”

On some level, Jaques was harkening back to the days when he was prostituted out to crack dealers by his junkie mom and dad. A seasoned veteran may observe this behavior and make a comment such as, “You seem really stressed out, Jaques. I’d really like to help you out but I can’t do that when you’re naked. Let’s put your clothes on and think about better ways to talk about your anger.” Best to address the underlying feelings that cause the behavior, rather than react to the disgusting behavior.

Tyrell was a stocky, dim-witted staff who was as badly “ghetto-ized” as any of the kids. I never figured out how exactly he was allowed to work with children, I just figured he knew somebody and was able to pull some strings. He was illiterate, could barely annunciate well enough to be understood, and sometimes seemed to be enjoying chemical pleasures.

Tyrell’s response to Jaques behavior was to tackle him and drag him by the feet to the Quiet Room where he launched him into the far wall, head-first.

Tyrell tried to use his verbal skills that he learned from staff meeting. “You only do dat cuz yo’ mama fucked you up. You don’ know if you some kinda faggot cuz you fucked up in the head by yo’ mama. You jes’ git yo’ ass beat once or twice and you stop, you’ll see.”
This strategy didn’t seem to be working on Jaques, who had now stripped down naked and was peeing on the walls. Tyrell called to Jaques through the door, “Oh, I see. I know what you doin’. You peein’ cuz yo’ daddy messed wiff you an’ now you some kinda faggot. You fucked up boy, an’ someone need to beat yo’ ass!”

Hearing this, I decided to relieve Tyrell and switch off with him. I rounded the corner to the Quiet Room to hear Tyrell yelling, “Oh I know you not about to do dat! Oh you did, you muthafucka!”

Jaques shoved his own shit through the top crack of the door. It oozed out like that Playdough barbershop toy and plopped on to the floor. I laughed at Tyrell and called out, “The eagle has landed, the eagle has landed!”

Tyrell said, “Dat jes’ one fucked up muthafucka. Ain’t no hope for him.” He walked out of the house right then and there and I never saw him again.

One of the more difficult kids to deal with is Jose (10). He is so young, and yet so sophisticated when it comes to flaunting his abilitiy to confound and tease both staff and kids. He is unashamedly sexualized and will enumerate his many sexual conquests during our issue groups.
He will point around the room, “I sucked his dick, his dick, he sucked mine but I didn’t suck his, he booty-bumped me. Oh, I didn’t do him yet, but I’m going to…” It just goes on and on and it is very effective in getting the boys riled up, even sabotaging whatever plans we may have had for the day.
We have had to be creative in our crisis interventions with him as well. For a long time, when Jose would tantrum, he would strip off his clothes in the Quiet Room and pee all over the place. If you were one of the unlucky staff dealing with him, you also risked getting peed on. He revels in the negative attention and downright shock that some staff give him when he does this.
Look up Borderline Personality Disorder and you’ll see a picture of Jose. He idealizes his relationship with my huge black teammate, Gus, and will be sweet as can be until Gus sets any kind of limit with him. This sends Jose into fits. He will scream and yell, often assaulting someone to force Gus to pay attention to him.
Once, I went to check on Jose, who was locked in the Quiet Room by Gus. Gus is sitting there calmly and says, “Jose’s having a few problems.” I look through the plexiglass window to see Jose, butt naked, skating barefoot through streaks of shit.
On the wall he had written “I (heart) Gus.” With his own shit.
What we’ve been able to do is instead of taking him to the Quiet Room when he tantrums is to take him to the Supervisor’s office, which has a bathroom, put him in the bathtub and let him tantrum there. That way, he can piss and shit all he wants and he doesn’t cause as much mess, and it doesn’t require as much staff attention when he does it.
One such occasion occurred one Saturday as Gus was packing some lunches to leave on an outing with some other boys. Jose thought he was going on the outing.
“Hey Gus, where are we going on the outing? Six Flags?”
“Oh, no, Jose, you ain’t going nowhere. Not with the kind of behavior you’ve been having all week.”
Jose was stunned. “Oh hell no! Trick that, bitch. In that case, I’m just going to have to do what I always do, that way NO ONE gets to go.”
He began stripping and walking to the Quiet Room. Anticipating this, Gus and I grabbed him and walked him to the Supervisor’s bathroom and put him in the bathtub. Gus left for the outing and I sat in a chair in the doorway, out of piss-reach. Jose was livid to lose Gus.
“Think you can keep me in here? Well you can’t! It’s abuse plus I’m just gonna come out of here and piss on you!”
He grabbed his tiny, 10 year old dick, started pissing, and made stretching, thrusting movements as if that would help him gain the necessary distance to soak me.
I said in a non-chalant tone, “Jose, any move you make towards me will be considered an attempted assault and you will find yourself proned face down in that puddle of piss. Not only that, but I will use whatever amount of force to get you down there first, and only then will I call another staff for support. I hope you understand my words.”
“I understand that you’re a faggot-shit-liking bitch is what I understand.”
“I find it highly ironic that YOU would call ME a faggot-shit-liking bitch, Jose.”
“What? Oh hell no, you just called me a faggot! I’m telling my therapist!”
“I didn’t call you anything. I’m just making an observation about your past behavior.”
“What! I’m gonna hoo-ride this house, fucka!”
I said, “You know, Jose, if you really want to do something effective here, you should start talking about your issues. It might help you deal with your anger. You’re standing there butt-ass naked in front of a grown man, and I’m just wondering what kinds of feelings come up for you when you do that.”
“What! You just called me a faggot again! You’re trying to make me say I want to kill my grandpa, but I’m not! You can’t make me say it. You think he abused me because you don’t like him and you want him to go to jail. You think you can outsmart me to make me tell lies, but you’re just a fucked up child abuser. You probably like looking at naked boys!”
“Actually, I would rather be on the outing with Gus. My behavior has been really good all week and I think I deserve to go. How about you, do you deserve to go?”
Nigga! I’m telling my therapist you’re provoking me! You’re gonna get fired!”
“Well, you’re gonna need to tell Flip Joseph or someone like that, therapist don’t fire people. Plus, you might want to put on some clothes before you tell, they might take you a little more seriously.”
And on it goes. Unbelievably, Jose did manage to make it on an outing once. Somehow he was able to put together about 3 weeks of really good behavior and earned the privilege of going on an outing.
I love nature and I love to take the guys out to experience it. Of course I take precautions such as bringing sunscreen, carrying water and helping them to identify poison oak. Mellow Bill and I took a group of 4 boys, including Jose, to one of those big regional parks with paddle boats and things. As we walked down a trail, I heard Bill having a conversation with Jose.
“See Jose? Staff doesn’t lie. If you have good behavior and work your program, you get rewarded. Wouldn’t you rather be out here in nature than standing in the bathtub trying to piss on people?”
“Hell yeah! You know why? They got Choco-Tacos here. I seen ‘em at that snack bar place. I’m gonna get me one of those bad boys.”
Bill replied, “I like that idea. I might even buy one for you.”
I had to intervene. “You know what Bill, Jose hasn’t earned any allowance since he’s been here. In fact he still owes the house money for all those potted plants he broke. I think it would be a bad message to buy him something when he still owes us money.”
Bill demured, “Oh well Jose, you can still have the Red Vines and Cheez-Its we packed. No sense in getting upset over a Choco-Taco. Maybe you can get one on the next outing you go on.”
Jose turned red with anger. “Hell no, mutha-fucka, I ain’t never going on no other outing! You need to get me a Choco-Taco now, or I’m gonna hoo-ride this stupic-ass nature hike. Oh no way! You bitches are gonna get fired and I’m gonna make sure of that. You guys can’t take care of no one, you’re just child abusers!”
Jose ran to the edge of the trail and jumped into large patch of poison oak. He picked a handful of leaves and started rubbing them over his arms and legs.
“See? I told you you can’t take care of no one. Now you’re going to get fired because I’m going to get poison oak. You think you’re so goddamn smart, but I guess I just outsmarted you, you punk-ass bitch!”
After we got home later that evening, staff decided that Jose should never go on any other outings, ever. He’s just too goddamn smart for them.

Every once in a while, we are presented with unique opportunity to help a child develop some advanced skills outside of the agency, in the community. These events have to be highly structured and supervised, of course, but if a kid has really made a significant amount of progress, it is possible that we can sign him up for some community classes sponsored by the city, such as ceramics or drama classes.

One such opportunity presented itself in the person of Brian, my Special Kid who struggles with sexual identity. He had been with us almost 3 years and we were beginning to plan for his transfer to a lower level of care. He and I had made a lot of progress coming to terms with the fact that his hypochondriac, gay, fat mom who allowed her lovers to beat Brian just might not ever be available to him to just be a mom.

One hint was that she had converted Brian’s old room into a shrine for All Things Rainbow. Any painting, flag, window art, kite or piece of shit doo-dad that had a rainbow on it was crammed into the small room leaving no room for other things like, say, Brian’s bed. Brian’s dad was unavailable for the foreseeable future due to a previous commitment in a facility for the criminally insane. So, foster care seemed to be a good option for Brian, and he was accepting and moving in that direction.

For the entire time that he has been staying with us, Brian has had a penchant to add a little extra drama to whatever he did. His blowouts were peppered with rants such as

“What I need from you is a goddamn positive male role-model, not a fat, drunk idiot!”

or

“Who the hell do you think you are, my dad? I had a dad and look where he left me. With you!”

He returned from an outing to an amusement park one evening, and declared in a tortured yet resolved whisper, “I guess it’s just my fate in life to be hurt. I asked a girl for her number and after she gave it to me, she pinched my ass. Once again, staff left me alone to be sexually abused.”

When rewarded with public acknowledgement or praise, he would bite his knuckle and force a tiny tear out of his eye. So, as his Special Counselor, it was not rocket science to assume that he could benefit from and enjoy some community acting classes.

It was summer, I had gotten him all signed up and we were driving the van to the community theatre where the classes were being held. Brian was nervous and chatty, doing his best impersonation of a straight, normal 13 year old. He was wearing a brand new outfit we had purchased from Ross Dress for Less, a 2 sizes too big button down baseball jersey and some huge black jeans, and the ubiquitous-in-the-group-home, daily polished, sometimes black-marketed high topped basketball shoes with the one name: Jordans. In other words, he was wearing the outfit that screamed out “Hey everybody! I’m from the group home!”

I like to get to the community center early so that Brian and I can have “special time.” That is, we get to have some one on one time together in a much more relaxed atmosphere than at the House.  This Special relationship has many benefits, one of which is the kids sometimes tell you things they’ve never told anyone else.  This seemed to be one of those moments.

We were sitting in the van waiting for the class to begin.  Brian took a sip from his Big Gulp and asked , “Do you ever wonder what it’ll be like after I graduate?”

 

I asked, “You mean like, will you ever come to terms with your true self?”

 

He said, “ You’re always kidding around, Stokie!”

 

I shook my head, “Not always, Brian.”

 

He continued, “ I mean, like, would you ever want to visit me just to see how I’m doing or just to hang out for a while?”

 

“ Oh yeah, of course I would. I’m planning on doing that anyway, and I’m glad you’re thinking about it too.”

 

Then he said, “ Well, I’ve been thinking about it a lot, and I’m just wondering what you would tell everyone after you got back. I mean, I know you can’t keep a secret with the staff, but would you have to tell all the kids too?”

 

That was a strange question, I thought.  “ I’m starting to feel uncomfortable with this conversation. I don’t like talking about keeping secrets. Why can’t you just ever say what’s on your mind? And no, I’m not keeping any secrets.”

 

“ Okay,” he said.  “Here goes. Picture yourself coming to visit me and you’re kind of dressed up but not really dressy, just kind of better than you usually dress at work. Just looking really nice. And you knocked on the door and you knew you had the right address so you knew I had to live there. Then somebody opened the door but it wasn’t me. It was a really pretty lady with long flowing hair and a really pretty dress with flowers, the kind you can almost see through but not quite. And you said, ‘Oh excuse me, Miss, I thought Brian lived here.’ And the lady said, ‘I am Brian. But they call me Brianna now.’”

 

I winced.  “ This disturbs me on so many levels I don’t even know where to begin.”

 

He unmoved.  “ Sometimes I just think I’m more like a girl than a boy. And just

tell me the truth. Somebody told me that there was a way to turn boys into girls and girls into boys. Is that true? Have you ever done that for any of your old Special kids?”

 

“ I don’t think the county would appreciate my helping you in that way.”

 

“ Well I heard there was a way.”

 

I was curious.  “Have you told your therapist any of this stuff?”

 

He frowned.  “Why would I tell him? That’s my private business. We just play

board games.”

 

I wanted to change the subject.  “Anyway, what else do you think you’d like to do when I visit, hang out at the mall?”

 

He perked up.  “Well I don’t know. Do they have that kind of dress at Macy’s?”

 

He actually did quite well in the class. Sure he was nervous and overly-hyper, but he was enjoying himself, oblivious to the stares and smirks he was getting from his peers. The instructor had the kids go through all kinds of activities, miming, theatre games, improvisation. At one point, the group was acting out a scene where Brian ultimately got shot and he flung himself to the stage floor with a flourish. When it was all over, he and I were walking back to the van.

 

“Uh, Stokie, can I talk to you about something important?”
“Of course, that’s what I’m here for.”
“Well, remember that scene when I got shot? Well look.”
He lifted up his loose fitting jersey and just below his navel, where his pants should have been but weren’t because they were sagging far below his Pokemon boxers was a huge piece of wood about six inches long and an inch wide, sticking out from his belly. He said, “I think I got a splinter.”
“Jesus Christ, Brian, that’s not a splinter, that’s a goddamn spike. What the hell happened?”
“When I dove on the stage, a big piece of wood cracked off and stuck in me. You know,” he said with a quiver, “It’s really starting to hurt.”
“Why didn’t you say something, Brian? That happened about a half an hour ago.”
“I was embarrassed someone would laugh at me. I didn’t want to make everyone stop just because I got a piece of wood got stuck in my stomach.”

The whole time we were talking, all I was thinking was that I should distract him momentarily and yank the wood out when he wasn’t expecting it.

I said, “So, tell me about that scene again,” and at the same time grabbed the wood and gave it a stiff tug. I pulled the stick and Brian’s pudgy tummy bent out but did not release the stick. Brian screamed in pain.

“You motherfucker! What’s wrong with you? Can’t you see I need professional medical attention?”

I felt terrible and sick to my stomach. However, I thought that it would be a favor to both of us if we didn’t have to sit around in the emergency room all day so I motioned toward him with a determined look in my eye. He yelled, “Oh hell no!” and ran.

I grabbed him from behind, spun him around. I blocked his hands with one arm and with the other, grabbed the stick again and yanked, much harder than before. Brian screamed and fell to the ground. The stick didn’t budge.

I said, “You know, I think you have a point about the medical attention,” and drove to the hospital.

In the emergency room, the nurses numbed up the area (lots of shrieking and knuckle-biting on Brian’s part) and pulled out the stick. Brian calmed down and I was standing at the nurses’ station gathering up some paperwork. One of the nurses pulled me aside and said, “You know, if anything like that happens again, you might just consider distracting him and then yanking it out yourself. Might save you a trip to the hospital.”

I nodded in mock interest. “Oh, yeah. I wish I would have thought of that.”