The Three Christs of Ypsilanti (16 page)

3:10 p.m. The three men, along with several others, have finished their work in the laundry room and are ambling back to their ward in D building. Leon's mother is leaving the hospital grounds and walks wearily toward the moving cluster of men. As they approach, she sees her son. Her anguished expression suddenly changes to one of happy anticipation: he has changed his mind and is now coming to greet her. As Leon comes nearer, the two are, for a moment, face to face. But Leon, as if unseeing, passes her by. Her smile disappears; she utters a prolonged wail. The research assistant tries to console her, but to no avail. Leon reaches the entrance to D building, looks back fleetingly, and quickly goes in.

6:00 p.m. Today is Saturday. Clyde keeps looking at the clock. “I thought the folks was going to come by now,” he says. “I guess they're not going to come.” Joseph rounds up Clyde and Leon for a group discussion.

11:47 a.m. Leon overhears two aides discussing paranoid schizophrenia. One says that it is a reaction to homosexuality and,
furthermore, that everyone has some degree of paranoia. As soon as they leave, Leon says to me: “I disagree, sir. There are people who aren't insane, and I'm one of them. People who generalize are mentally ill.”

7:00 p.m. Joseph, Clyde, and Leon are seated in their usual places in the recreation room. Characteristic of each is the way they stare. Joseph stares vacantly, as if daydreaming, or bored. Clyde appears to be looking around at something he sees, either real or fancied. Leon looks straight ahead with an expression of intense concentration and asceticism, much like a holy man in deep meditation.

Supper. A woman patient comes over to Leon to get a light from his cigarette. She holds his hand to steady it. “Please, madam, no suggestive touching with the hand.” “I'm sorry,” she replies, “I didn't intend anything.”

Group meeting. Joseph puts a book out on the window sill “to give it some air.” This, he says, will make the book healthier for him to read. Leon reads aloud from an article in the
Reader's Digest
about voting to select a national flower. Leon votes for dandelions, Joseph and Clyde vote for grass.

Group meeting. Leon describes an amusing episode involving himself and a former girl friend. He had known the girl only a few weeks. A married couple were in the front seat of the car, and Leon and his girl were in the back. “I had the sensation of cosmic infusion directed toward me,” Leon said, “and I knew definitely it was female and that that part-Belgian girl could sure pour it on because I grabbed hold of her and kissed her so tight that her bridge cracked. She told me about it later on. She told me: ‘Don't do that; it cost me seventy dollars to have my teeth fixed.' And I thought to myself: ‘You started it,' and I gave her another one.”

It is now over two months since Leon's mother made her unhappy visit. Leon mentions the incident in a letter addressed to “Respected Sirs; and Madam,” which reads: “In September the Old Witch visited me, and the first thing I sensed as I came into her vision was duping pressure and her facial color was turning from yellow to green, and her-and-other-persons duping aroused me and I raised my voice and told her ‘Madam, I do not care for your ideal (negative), I told you prior to this visit to get out, and stay out, you are an Old Witch.' That attendant tried to deny this, and I got angrier at the evil ideal and I firmly indicated gradually with the back of my arm as I told him to ‘keep out of my personal life, he does not know my past experience' (with her sentimental duping ideal), and he shielded her, whereas I had no intention whatsoever of doing her physical harm, as I repeated my positive idealed verbal statements, he behind me and pushing me marched me toward the ward—as I said ‘let me explain'—but he didn't, so I am explaining now, and before I entered I thanked her for her visit; but did not agree to the duping ideal from her and those others, arousing me such. I now realize my eyes were held (at that time), and because of my anger against the evil ideal of duping I did not see the Court Correction Acknowledgment against the dupe name, and I did
not
refuse that Correction Acknowledgment, I refused the evil idealed intentioned attachment it was tried to be presented with.”

Thanksgiving Day. Joseph submits a written report on the group meeting.

December 14. Leon tells us that he had a birthday yesterday. His only celebration, he remarks, was to say “Happy Birthday” to himself in the mirror. Then he adds: “December 25 is not the date of Jesus' birth. This date was set for business reasons. December 25 is business Christmas.”

Mid-morning. The ward psychiatrist calls Leon into his office to inform him that his mother has just passed away. “I have no mother,” Leon responds. “She disowned me a long time ago, and I have disowned her.” He goes on to say that he didn't hate her, he just hated the “evil ideal” for which she stood and may her remains rest in peace and her works follow after her. He shows no visible reaction to the news. Asked if he thought it was appropriate for us to tell him of it, he says: “If you mean by that, sir, do I want to go to her funeral, the answer is no.” Asked if he felt unhappy about his mother's death, he replies: “No, sir, why should I feel bad? She wasn't my mother.” Asked if he would like to take the rest of the day off from work, he replies: “No, why should I?” And he continues, without emotion, to say that he would rather go back to work in the laundry.

Early evening. Joseph informs Leon and Clyde it is time for the group meeting. Leon, seeing a research assistant, approaches him and says: “Sir, I have been misinformed again.” When asked what it was he had been misinformed about, he states he had been informed that Joseph had passed away. Who had informed him of this? Clyde. During the group meeting Leon insists, in Joseph's presence, that Joseph has died, and that the body attending the meeting is a living body, which is not Joseph, although it is in the same shape as Joseph. He states further that Joseph's reincarnation is not a true reincarnation such as that of Jesus Christ, but some kind of Frankenstein monster. Joseph, on hearing this, laughs loudly and says: “Well, there are some people who
wished I had passed away, but I have not passed away.” Leon, asked if he isn't getting two different people confused, denies this. In contrast to his outer calm earlier in the day upon hearing of his mother's death, he is now obviously anguished. He seems to have aged ten years since this morning.

Two days later, Leon is interviewed alone to ascertain in more detail his attitude toward his mother's death. He expresses much the same attitudes as those already elicited, but adds that he feels sorry for her if she didn't repent before she died. “Considering her attitude, I sincerely believe she didn't repent.” While he is speaking he gazes intently at the palms of his hands, not once looking up. When asked about this he says: “It's advisable to have them in view. I know what I'm doing with them.”

Leon reports that he heard a resident psychiatrist and a nurse discussing an article on schizophrenia which showed that a certain drug treatment had been a failure. “My analysis,” Leon goes on, “is that you build up the body first and then use positive suggestion. You can only put so much in a test tube. The rest has to be done through the ego. Those particular physicians that get it into their heads that a drug can erase an emotional factor, I got news for them. The ego is above all vibrations.”

Joseph agrees. “You can't put your mind in a test tube.”

—
Do you mean a man can recover from schizophrenia by improving his ego?
—

“You need a combination of therapy,” Leon answers. “Some cases need more or less of physical, mental, or spiritual.”

I ask them if they think they need psychological therapy.

“No, I just need a dismissal,” Joseph replies.

“When all the imposition is shaken off,” says Leon, “I'll be myself as I'm supposed to be.”

Group meeting. Joseph brings a Mother Goose book and remarks that it might be of interest to Leon. Leon leafs through it
and says: “I'll read the one about Humpty Dumpty.” After he reads it: “Now, there's some worthwhile psychology. The truth in it is the fact that an egg can break.”

Group meeting. I suggest that their meeting room needs some furnishings, and offer to allot some money so that we can all go over to Ann Arbor to shop. Joseph remarks that he doesn't care for pictures, that the room as it is is reminiscent of England, spick and span cleanliness. “You start putting pictures on the wall,” he adds, “and everybody will come over here to look at them, and there'll be somebody in here all the time.” Leon agrees.

The meeting room has a very small table and I replace it with a larger, more attractive table. Leon complains that this table has “greater polarity” than the other one. He examines it very carefully, bending down to look underneath. He finds cobwebs. “You'd be surprised how much cosmics cobwebs give off,” he says. He cleans the table very carefully, then claims that the polarity has diminished.

I remark that I can't tell for sure whether Leon wants the table or not. He suggests they vote on it. Joseph says he wants it, and so does Clyde.

“I'm outvoted, sir,” Leon says, very, very cheerfully. “The table stays.”

Late at night. All fifteen patients in the dorm are in their beds, but there is a great deal of restlessness because one of the patients is snoring loudly. Finally one of the patients, exasperated, yells: “Jesus Christ! Quit that snoring.” Whereupon Clyde, rearing up in his bed, replies: “That wasn't me who was snoring. It was him!”

Joseph goes to the Social Service Department. “Can I help you?” the secretary inquires. Joseph answers: “Yes, I am God. I've come to see about a release from the hospital.”

Leon is in the dayroom, watching TV. When asked if he enjoys Western movies, he replies: “Yes, I enjoy them very much. They all have a plot and in the end the good or righteous people always win out.”

Breakfast. Clyde comes back to the kitchen to get three more pieces of toast, to make a total of nine pieces. He's been doing this for some time now. It must be nine and no less.

Joseph seems apprehensive about the impending departure of the research assistants. He says to one: “So pretty soon you won't be here anymore. I'm going to miss you. I imagine after a while that the group meetings will stop too, huh?” When asked why he thinks this, Joseph replies: “Oh, I don't know. Before this they only used to meet once in awhile, maybe every year or so, and then they'd go away.”

The research assistants leave today, to be replaced by a new assistant. It is evening and time to say goodbye. Clyde is sitting on his bed, chortling gleefully. The assistant on duty decides against interrupting Clyde's euphoria. He goes to Leon, who is in the recreation room, to bid him goodbye. Leon leaps up with a broad friendly grin, gives the assistant a firm handshake, saying: “I enjoyed knowing you. Yes, sir, pertaining to the conversations—it's been interesting.” He declines the invitation to write, explaining that if anything important comes up the assistant will get a copy by “dove” mail. Joseph, too, says he'll miss the assistant, but doesn't get up from his chair as he bids him goodbye. He lacks Leon's forceful firmness, and seems somewhat uncomfortable in contrast to Leon's composure and savoir-faire.

Meeting. The three men are introduced to Miss Miller, one of the Friend's volunteer workers who is here for the summer. The talk is mostly between Miss Miller and Joseph and centers on literature. Joseph reads from Whitman and seems to be enjoying
her company. He is unusually relaxed. Miss Miller suggests that she and Joseph meet tomorrow to read in the park. They meet for several days and read literature and poetry to each other.

Meeting. Today's visitor is Mr. Zandt, a graduate student in psychology. Leon asks him: “You really think you're cut out to be a psychologist?” and goes on to say that a psychologist must have spiritual insight; can't just say, go see the chaplain.

Joseph laughs, but won't explain what's funny. I remark to him that he often knows exactly why he does and says certain things. “That's quite possible,” Joseph agrees. “Sometimes you know but you don't divulge.”

“I love truth even though it hurts,” Leon says. “If it hurts too much,” Joseph replies, “man is wise to turn away from it.”

“That's your belief, sir.”

Joseph submits a written report of a meeting:

Leon defines the word
parable
. “Parables go from higher level ideas to lower level expression so that a person with less education can understand.”