“Last year I went fishing with Salvador Dali. He was using a dotted line. He caught every other fish.” ~Steven Wright

Discussing the fact that I had to have Pearlsky served (in the legal sense) with papers, I wrote this in a recent post on guardianship:

Back in college I was a bouncer for a while at a popular hole-in-the-wall across the street from the ball park. I had the reputation of carding everyone, and I mean EVERYONE. I would have carded Ghandi. It did not matter what you looked like, how old you appeared, etc., you got carded.

I have come across another “where do you draw the line?” issue …

Some interesting materials showed up in the mail yesterday. Both my fifteen-year-old son and my seventeen-year-old daughter received applications to register to vote from the state. Very interesting, especially since this has not been my son’s address for ten years. The application has a place for the applicant to sign but it also has a place for the name and address of the person filling out the form for the applicant if said applicant is disabled and cannot sign it. The rules on voting that are in the booklet also clearly state that if the voter is disabled and needs assistance, s/he may choose someone to help in the voting booth or receive help from an official at the voting place.

My question with the guardianship issues (we go to court in two weeks), if you remember, is why do I need to serve papers to Pearlsky, why jump through all the hoops and over the hurdles since it is soooooo obvious to anyone that Pearlsky needs a full guardian? Shouldn’t there be a point where we all say “this is stupid” and just do it?

At what point do we say, “No, you can’t vote.” There are times we say that, these are “black and white” issues, such as “Not a citizen, you can’t vote” or “Felon? Sorry, you can’t vote.” We don’t have “Retarded? Nope, no voting for you.” Nor do we have “Severely disabled? Can’t communicate at all? Cute as hell and loved? Nope, you can’t vote.”

The state insists on testing Pearlsky in the No Child Left Behind joke (for this population). I fought it all the way to the US Congress, and actually got her out of it, but that’s another story. The law says Pearlsky MUST be tested in mathematics and social studies. It says she must be served papers and told they are for her mom and dad to have guardianship of her, and told that she can get a lawyer and fight it in court. Yes, she was told that. The worst part is she may understand it, BUT SHE CANNOT COMMUNICATE her response. But I digress.

Where is the line? No matter how “incapacitated” we go through the same hoops. No matter what level of disability, we still do NCLB testing.

My point?

I registered Pearlsky to vote today.


Mom made it through surgery. My sister flew to them and took care of dad while mom was in the hospital. Tonight she expressed things about how much she has learned that I must be going through with Pearlsky all these years (i.e.: what it’s like to give 24/7 care). We are working on visiting nursing, etc.

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