Kneecapped
This past weekend my neighbor Dolly told me that she works with Mary, the Chief of the Attorney General’s Civil Rights Division and I should definitely send her the information about the school district. So I did.
Yesterday Dolly tells me … “I saw Mary in the hallway, and she said she responded to your email.” But alas, she had not.
This morning, the aide on Pearlsky’s bus was really pissed. She saw in the email that the head nurse claimed the aide has been giving the amino acid for “for more than 10 years.” It is actually an important point that this is not true. As soon as the bus leaves, this email goes out to everyone …
Ms. HeadNurse, Asst. Superintendent, et alia:
Please note, and this is important, Ms. HeadNurse’s statement:
“Pearlsky has successfully received the amino acid for more than 10 years from her 1:1 para.”
is patently false. Did anyone ask said “para” if in fact this was true? It was only AFTER you, Ms. HeadNurse, took over in your current position were the nurses instructed to deny Pearlsky the doctor mandated amino acid that prevents her seizures and much more. Simply asking the “para,” or the nurses who have been with Pearlsky all this time, will verify the truth. Previous to your taking over, the nurses were properly caring for Pearlsky.
And it was quiet … for a while.
Close to lunchtime I get an email from the Assistant Superintendent, the head nurse’s supervisor. She simply asks for a phone number where she can reach me later in the day. I send her my google voice number, it rings my house, my cell and my office all at once.
And I’m thinking, what the heck is she going to say? Did the email push her over the edge? Did she fire the head nurse? Does she know about the official complaint against the nurse’s license with the Department of Public Health?
I go on the web, and I find the phone number for the State Attorney General’s office. I punch in the number for the Mary (Chief of the Attorney General’s Civil Rights Division). I swear, this is what followed …
Hello, Mary Smith.
Oh, come on. Is this her assistant or admin?
(chuckle) No, it’s really me.
You answer your own phone? Wow! I already think you’re great. My name is SingleDad, a friend of Dolly.
You know, I saw Dolly yesterday, I am so glad you called. I thought I answered your email, I am so sorry …
I told her that no apologies were necessary, she was incredibly nice. I must say she is very well known and a very powerful force in civil rights around here.
We talk, she knew most of the issues. Lots of questions about the amino acid topic, I tell her I am actually more upset about the summer trip to the pond that the nurse did not allow Pearlsky to go on. She said “me too.” She knew the names of the Superintendent and the Assistant Superintendent, etc. Just a great woman.
I then told her that the Assistant Superintendent was going to call me later in the day, I did not know why. She asked for my phone number and said she would get back to me.
She calls a few minutes later.
I left a voice mail for both the Superintendent and the Assistant Superintendent making clear that the Attorney General’s office was calling about Pearlsky and civil rights violations and they should call me back. If you speak to them first, let me know what happens.
Wow. Not wow … Holy shit.
Thirty minutes later she calls me again …
I spoke with the Assistant Superintendent. She understands the issues, she is not happy either, and her call to you is the solution to the amino acid problem. She explained the summer issue pretty much as confusion that took a few weeks to clear up.
It wasn’t confusion.
Understood.
I then said that the father-voracious-advocate in me wants to see the head nurse “publicly flogged in the town square.” We discussed that I could bring civil rights charges, etc. but she also felt that a call from her to the Superintendent and the Assistant Superintendent is a pretty major smack down (my words, but hers were equivalent). Additionally, the complaint to the Licensure Division is continuing. Then she tried to apologize again for not getting right back to my email. I told her not to worry about it.
The Assistant Superintendent calls. Not a word about Mary, just to tell me that she will try to get an email out tomorrow to the head nurse specifying that the nurses will be giving the amino acid, period, but she would leave a voicemail today. She reminded me how she is not into email and I should call immediately if there are other problems (yeah, SingleDad not putting things in writing, uh-huh). I thanked her, and that’s that.
OK, a show of hands … who wants my life?
I assume either everyone “got” the title to the previous post … or you emailed Ken and he explained it. 🙂
Do you read Kafka? I’ve got a solution to the sealed container nonsense. Buy one of those home gadgets that vacum seals plastic bags. Then make multiple copies of the package lables from the bulk package you buy and glue them on. Now you have a sealed, labled package, and bragging rights.
“Wow. Not wow … Holy shit.” Cool.
I just don’t believe it.
Something. isn’t. right. here. It sounds…too good to be true. Especially that call me thing. People are very, what’s the word…not predictable, cause they still always can surprise you, but they are…I dunno, fuck it, I can’t find a word, but still, it’s plain to me that there was a distinct effort made by the person to try to discourage you from writing. She may not have even been AWARE of it consciously…but it’s there. And it means something. Like Dreyfus with that mashed potato pile…
Yeah, I am WAY too cynical. There are still some big chunks of turd headed for the fan, I can see them just off to the east of the horizon line.
I await…mouth closed, head slightly turned and goggles ready.
This is not over.
Oh and I don’t even get the dirty knees thing…unless you mean that you have dirty knees because you are currently and viciously getting raped up the poop chute by all of this OR, because these people are trying so hard to distract you by sucking you off with hocus pocus and other such nonsense, thereby giving themselves dirty knees?
Those are my two working theories at the moment.
This is the kind of thing where I would need a lot more time to see things handled differently before I believed that real change had occurred. The right people are making the right assurances, and that’s all great, but it’s like…you really need to see the change happen, and become it’s own new routine, before you believe it’s permanent, you know?
Regarding her not being “into” email, I can give her the benefit of the doubt about that because I feel the same way about the phone.
But what you can do is call her when there’s a problem and let her know on the phone that you will follow up with an email outlining the content of the conversation, to make sure you are all on the same page (and to leave a paper trail).
Last night I was walking across my tiled foyer in socks while carrying a laundry basket, slipped and landed on my knees and then slowly fell forward onto my face. As I was lying there there, the title of your post popped into my head, haha.
(I’m on the younger side so I’m completely fine btw. Just bruised knees and ego.)