......They'll see. So I talk dumb and look dumb. One of these days I'll have a name the newspapers'll know. Retarded was the nicest thing people called me to my face. They, the other kids and adults in Buckeye, also called me an idiot; a fucking mongoloid (I mean, damn, this one pissed me off); other jerko kids called me a sped-head or slobber lips or zooey, and probably even worse things behind my back; and the most common one in my long life of being called shitty words was dumdum. They said, "Hey Billy! Hey 'White Ape Man! Hey Dumdum!" And they would draw out that last word and make it sound more than stupid. Hate is their friendship set to their angry music. They all ended up to burn me, burn me up. Of course, they were right about a couple of things. I am white, partly a Hunky (more on this later), and I am apish because I am short and powerful and have a distorted face. You know the term Mongoloid. Or Downes’ Syndrome. Never grew past five feet tall and I weigh one hundred and fifty five pounds. I am solid muscle. Yes, when kids saw me they giggled and ragged me, and if I tried to say something back they laughed fucking out loud. Like, as soon as I opened my mouth, I defined myself to them. I have evil within me and much of it is from them. Their verbiage was worse than if they would have hit me. Much worse. Anyway, I like hitting and other things, especially taking it all out on one person. A tale which I will tell you about later.

......Actually, I am funny looking and I know it and don't mind much when I'm made fun of about that, or maybe, I've just grown into it and don't realize my anger comes from aging and growing up in the fifties’ lower class America. I'm an 'it.' I've never gotten used to being an 'it.' Sometimes it's funny being an it, you know, like being a comedian on TV, but most of the time it hurts like hell and anger is the only way to get by being an ‘it’. Yes, I like being angry most of the time. Love, I think, came into my life once for a short while, but it left. I think it’s easier to go around being angry. Yet, I deserve a lot of what I get. I just don't understand why. I do laugh dumbly and when I try to talk, the words come out like I'm drunk. The Buckeye Hungarian neighborhood kids laugh and say, "Huh,... huh,... huh? Whatsta matter, dumdum can't talk?" Hate that. I'm twenty-five years old right now. Bad stuff has happened every day of my life. When the really bad stuff first happened I was twenty years old. But we'll first go through the early stuff. My parents keep my hair buzz-cut, so I don't pull on it or twist it into a mess like I used to when I was a baby. I'm not even in the dumb class at Harvey Rice Elementary in the Buckeye neighborhood of Cleveland. I'm dumber than that. I was labeled as a T.M.R. (trainable mentally retarded). Like maybe I had a chance to have a job or something like a job. Talk about stupid. They, the smart-ass intellectuals don't get it. My parents got angry for a second, and tried to get me in a religion school down here like First Hungarian Reformed or St. Margarette's cause my dad was Catholic or St. John's Greek Catholic cause it might have been cheap. But they found out it wasn't. Anyway they got me in something they call a "mentally retarded school and sheltered workshop." Don't know what the hell that means. It's 1961, and they don't know much about retards. Fact is, they don't know how to talk to us, what to teach us, or what to do with us as we get older especially if we're dangerous. If we are nice, now-a-days they stick us in a McDonalds somewhere. You know, work for below minimum wage and be happy for the customers and empty garbage cans and sweep floors. And be cute.


...... As far as the science of it all, today, I heard, they changed the labels and all that pseudo-jargon, but they still don't know how to handle us or where to put us or what to say to us or even if they should touch us. Or hug us. All kinds of legal gunk and mental health vocabulary and intelligent stuff like that. Fucking shame, I say. God's got to be an asshole for making most of us. I think he gets things wrong sometimes. He is not perfect. Or, as I would say, "Goshhhh iz shit, Goshhh iz, I'z thimkz!" Yes, they still, today, don't know what to do with us. Except, hide us away. Transplanted hearts, go to the fucking moon, got missiles that can take u-turns to hit their specific targets, I mean, just about can heal cancer, but they can't make us dummies better, except just give us pills to dull our dumb brains and bodies more, trying to quiet us. I mean, if I could say real words, I could tell you a lot of things. Can't, and deep inside, I don't give a shit about them words anymore. Just got a hold of the basics. You'll understand my basics as you read on. Hell, at least, you can read on. Guess you're lucky. Huh? I mean you can do the three R's. I don't know them. And most other things. Sometimes I forget I got to shit and my pants get brown and they, my pants, have to remind me about the basics. They give me classes about it and everything to try and help me. Then I feel dumber than I am at that instant. And get mad at you, yes you, for being smart enough to control your own shit. You fucking regular Americans make me sick. "The big they" are always kissing your ass. The President and the Congress guys are always taking polls to see what you are thinking so they can kiss your asses. And capitalism, yes, the industries are doing the same to see what you want to buy or “what you should buy.” Kissy, kissy. But us retards. Who gives a shit? Pack us away in retard bins, every once in awhile doing news blurbs on us when we do nice things and stay nearly comatose from the fucking drugs you pour into us. Make movies about us if they are nice movies and cute towards dumb people, so you can have the warm feeling in your collective bellies about us. Huh? Sure, good Americans, everything is going well in the world while the collective power muggers smile, smile and kissy, kissy.

......So, you see, I am a real dummy. I couldn't write any of this. A Buckeye kid is remembering me and writing it all down. I don't know why he cares. I think he wants you to know about me, know that some of us sped heads can be bad or just stupid or both, or maybe he wants you to know you people really haven't figured out how to handle us yet, especially when we do bad things. Now, got to tell you, I see a lot of us on TV and in major motion pictures, you know, the good ones of us, portraying in a sweet way, all lovey-dovey and mushy, and it makes you in the mass audience think everything is fine and dandy. All bullshit. Man, some of us even talk smart, like we know deep eternal things. You wonderful folks never truly listen to us. Most of us don't know shit. Socrates had a good idea, I suppose. He said, "Know thyself." But real dummies like me, Socrates did not have in mind when he gave out that advice. I don't know anything much, although the little I know is only about what I want, what I have to have. When I can't have it I get mad. But I do not know me. Never will and really don't want to know me. Just do regular stuff every second of a day and at night too. Don't know past or future. And don't want to know who I am. Too complicated for me, and I guess, it has been too complicated for you. Cause you just hide me away. Or try to. Don't you? I mean you try. And generally, it has worked out well. But sometimes you are not very successful. I got a story though. And you are going to read it only because I've piqued your interest. Admit it, you normal ones like sickly stories.


...... Everything you read or the things you watch on TV have icky parts to them. You like it when bad events occur and you get to watch them within the quietness of your home. Hell, the news is a good example of that. You love that shit. Ratings for TV are way up in that area. Real reality TV. The author was raised in my neighborhood; got to know me; had a brain aneurysm and was dumb for awhile but got better and feels like he is near "normal" again and has the license to write about me cause, well, cause, hell, I don't know why. Can't figure him out. I mean, I think he is normal. But also, I think he is a little messed up and knows it and doesn't deal with it well, except writing words down on paper and keeping himself in his house away from the rest of the hard world. This is not a pretty story. You may cry or get angry. I don't know. I don't care. If you want to turn back, go ahead. Do it now. It's a stupid story about a stupid person, and although it is sad at the end, you won't feel any pity for me. I want it that way. I got a lot of hate for you. Can't say it. But I do. Feel free, because every once in awhile I can get it out and it plops and slops all over you and makes you tense and not know what to do with us fuck-ups. We aren’t all nice like your next door neighbor. Some of us quiet ones mess you up, and then you feel you got the right to shove us under the rug. Our story doesn't get on TV because it has a bad ending. Only dummies that act cute, you know, get in the movies and eventually go on TV and are oh-so-cute. Not me. Said that before, didn't I?