Through high school I was put into the alternative or vegetable(low intelligence) classes.
The only thing that prevented me and my friends from being bullied was most of the bullies were in our class.
But we all knew we were stupid.
I knew I was stupid. Not just my lack of capacity in academia, but for the fact I would make bad decisions.
After highschool, I spent a few years working in garden centers and jobs that didn't require much intelligence. I drank a whole lot and attempted unsuccessfullly not to question my life.
After losing my second job I joined a gardening group made up of special needs young men. All in their late teens and early twenties. I could really feel I didn't belong.
The irony was I was too smart to be counted as really belonging there, and the guys I was working with were suspicipous of me, the few that accepted me had less awareness and didn't really interest themselves with who was what etc.
So too smart for the group, but too stupid for outside society. I had just enough knowledge to understand the depths of my uselessness. Infact I had had a strong sense of how unable I was, or below parr. Friends and family were often impatient and so I got used to those labels before puberty.
We were the special needs gardeners. learning a little about horticulture. Out truck would take us to a job. The tutor/supervisor would spend twenty minutes explaining the job, then find some designated spot in the shade to lay down and spark up his joint, making himself as dossile and slow as we were naturally. I didn't hate him. But perhaps his death could give me pleasure.
On this tuesday, I noticed the supervisor talking to Dylan. I cringed knowing he was using some reverse psychology or scheme to get Dylan or wired and rousing the other he would get up to something.
You see Dylan was one of these interesting cases where he had incredible hyperactivity and at the same time was incredibly suggestable or plainly naive. So our supervisor would sometimes tell him something that he shouldn't do, Knowing in fact that Dylan would do exactly that to spite him.
And after Dylan had recruited those of us who were disgruntled and pulled off whatever it was. They would do victory dances and scream incessantly. The supervisor would act disappointed and I was the one that knew what was what.
I disappointed my father a thousand times with my low wit, but one thing he gave me was the ability to question people and situations. And more importantly their motives. I wasn't the kind of dimwit who would be completely taken in, in some raw scam, eventhough people would try.
I just couldn't do my taxes, date women properly or have a proper relationship with my brother who was more successful than me and much younger.
Dylan was now talking to his followers, Mark, Dale and Peter beat. They were trying to hold back what they probably thought was evil laughter as Dylan relayed the thing that the supervisor didn't want them to do.
I decided to pretend to be part of it.
We were working on these huge gardens that surrounded the mall. Behind the mall there was a connection to a small quaint trainstation linking other towns to our town. Infront of the trainstation there was a big mound with flower beds and perrenial flowering bushes in the center.
The supervisor had told Dylan not to water that area too much, as it would collapse the garden into the earth leaving a big hole.
So Dylan had gone on his typical tirade about how we would rub their faces in it, by watering the garden until it sunk into a hole. And his followers bought it all. In times like these i would sometimes try to convince them that they were being tricked into doing something. But they would look at me and laugh, then taunt me. And after when they were doing their victory dance they would point out the disappointed expression of the tutor supervisor. And jeer in my face again shouting and screaming spitting saliva everywhere.
I helped them carry the hoses, I thought to myself thank God the supervisor didn't do this everyweek. The real reason he did it, was because Dylan's followers never watered the soil enough, sometimes leading to a die off of flowers. So this time our supervisor had conned us into watering properly by positioning it as something to avoid.
We stood there inthe shade of a great broad macrocarpa tree watering the mound.
Mark Dale and Pete Beat looked at me, a little surprised I was there, as I had usually opted out of endulging what they thought was their scheme.
About thirty minutes later the supervisor pulled up on the wide path in his small electric van. He had already turned off the water. He feigned that same look of disappointment. It was admittedly very convincing, until later I heard him on his phone trying to convince his girlfriend not to break up with him. Maybe he played his mind games on her as well.
I helped the group haul the hoses back to the equipment shed behind the mall. Dylan started bragging. "Pretty soon the garden will sink into the ground" He shouted triumphantly. Mark Dale and Pete wore grins that seemed too big for their faces. The nine others in the group looked on eagerly.
Dylan had become like a messiah to them.
I felt sick to my stomach that I hadn't done more with my creative imagination, or spent more time writing to publish. But who would want anything from me, a young man not smart enough for conventional standards, but not slow enough to be really considered special needs.
I remember the interview my parents had with my teacher at nine years old. The teacher said, "He's a good looking boy, he has such a wonderful smile. he just isn't bright."
But then I could blame noone, I was the only person responsible for finding the intelligence and vocation in myself. Other's were not responsible for helping me. My self esteem and hidden God given talents were only important to me. But in a world, blind to my few skills, in a world that compares, it all seemed real bleak.
Making that great mistake and comparing myself to this young man Dylan Foster, who was surprisingly popular at highschool, but whose delutsions and naivety were being manipulated every week to achieve the quota of the supervisor´s menial tasks.
