March 18, 2011
Ask a law librarian
Warning: This one will break your heart.
Woman enters law library wearing old black pantyhose trimmed to be a doo-rag.
Woman: “I’m not doing very good but maybe you can help me.”
Librarian: “I’ll try.”
Woman: “Sir, I’m not crazy or anything, but I need to file a lawsuit against my husband who is an undercover informant for the police department.”
Librarian: “What type of lawsuit do you want to file?”
Woman: “I don’t know. I went to the DA’s office to see if they could help me but they told me they don’t file civil lawsuits for individuals and they threatened to put me in jail” (begins to cry freely).
Librarian: “Here.” (hands Kleenex box)
Woman: “This is what happened. I went to the hospital because my husband beat me up. He broke my nose, made my ears bleed, tore my face – that’s why I have scars on my nose and chin and eyes and in the hospital was where I got chipped.”
Librarian: “Huh?”
Woman: “My face is not real” (slaps self in cheeks, nose, eyes) “my skin feels like sandpaper – touch it!” (starts crying again) “Sir, I’m not crazy! I have a 10th grade education! And my husband he went to college so he thinks that because I only went to the 10th grade I’m dumb. But I’m smarter than he thinks! I know that when I was in the hospital they pulled back the skin on my face to put a camera where my eyes are so I can record everything” (points to eyes emphatically) “my eyes record everything that I see and I can play it back over again. But I just want to get on with my life! I’m tired! I got a computer chip in my cheek that saves everything my eyes record. My ears” (points emphatically to ears) “record all the sounds and I hear it over and over and over again! I’m tired of it! And I smell popcorn all the time! Everywhere I smell popcorn! Everywhere I go! I’m tired of smelling popcorn!”
Librarian: “So who do you want to sue?”
Woman: “I’m not ashamed but at one time I was a prostitute and drug dealer. My husband used to beat me real bad when I didn’t bring home enough money. People say I went crazy when my sons went to prison. But that’s not why. It’s because the police keep following me because of the chip I have right here” (points to cheek). “And someone I think it’s the police keeps coming in my house because when I leave the room then come back things will be moved around in a different place from where I had left them.”
Librarian: “We have these examples of petitions here that you can look at.”
Woman: (begins to cry again) “But if I look at it they will know what I am doing because my eyes are cameras!”
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Damn.
I know.
Seems as though someone should sue someone, but I wouldn’t know where to start.
I think I’d start with the estate of Ronald Reagan, for instigating the wave of cuts to mental health funding.
Yep.
When I was in lawschool, I worked for the local prosecutor’s office, doing intake (among other things). People would come to us if they wanted to file criminal charges.
We had a woman very similar to this come into the office one day – convinced she had been microchipped and people were reading her thoughts.
Us young’uns were stumped, but our boss had much more success than I would have imagined when he asked “Do you have a social worker, or somebody who looks in on you?” She opened right up, and told us all about her social worker and the medicine she was on.
It, too, was very sad.
K
“My eyes record everything that I see” is just heart-wrenching.
The last line is the one that gets me, “But if I look at it they will know what I am doing because my eyes are cameras!”
It would be terrifying.
Some of y’all know that I have the (perhaps dubious) distinction of being a schizophrenic whisperer. I understand them and they understand me. I have to limit the time I spend with them, though, lest they completely break my heart.
A pharmaceutical company (I can’t remember the name) developed a virtual reality program that induces an emotional, visual, and psychological experience of schizophrenia. The point was to help scientists pinpoint areas of functioning for drug research, but it’s become quite popular with psychiatrists looking to fully understand schizophrenia. I’ve thought about it and I’m certain that, if given the chance to try it, I wouldn’t want to but I think I should.
That’s fascinating. I would definitely try that, if given the chance.
Hey, Kelsey, bring a dime bag of it to clusterflockstock!
A dime bag of virtual reality? Let me work on that.
Okay, thanks.
You can’t take virtual reality on planes!
I carry my virtual reality in various orifices, so unless a TSA agent decides to do a cavity search, I’m fine.