When a self-admitted crackhead—let’s call him Prisoner K—reads about a tropical rain forest, his mouth and index finger stumble over the words. He knows he’s set foot, temporarily, in unfamiliar terrain. “Can you pronounce this for me?” he asks.
“Photosynthesis,” I answer.
He’s learning about cause-and-effect relationships, where one “thing” can make another “thing” happen. More specifically, he’s studying the global effects of the rain forests. He repeats after me, “Pho-to-synnn-the-sis,” and continues to drag his finger across the page.
With guided practice and encouragement, Prisoner K is able to answer most questions. However, there’s one open-ended question troubling him to no end: What can you do to help prevent the destruction of tropical rain forests?
He smudges his first answer and starts over. “Quit chopping down trees,” he scrawls.
“Now Mr. K,” I ask, “when’s the last time you swung an axe or used a chainsaw?”
“Never.” He shows me where he found his answer—middle of page 84.
“You’re not a logger,” I point out.
“Nah, I’m just a former crackhead.”
I ignore his statement. “How about not wasting paper, how about recycling?” … “Paper comes from trees,” I add.
“Yeah,” he responds, “but nothing I do is gonna matter.”
13 comments:
I found this story sad.
He's trying - and yet believes nothing he does will matter.
Some of the simplest statements carry the deepest meanings...
Well, having worked int the vinyards of education for a while, I came to the subversive notion that education is a way through which a society transmits its propaganda.
Wait till they find out that it's the Siberian Taiga from which the earth gets it's oxyben and it's just to damn cold to go out there and chop the trees...Cold enough to seize up a McCulloch.
And you sure as hell cant create farmland up there as in Brazil.
Education somehow is tied up with eco-freaks, and I wish their thought leaders would stick to goosing fruit flies, as in the case of the famous Dr. Suzuki, who to me, hasn't contributed a hell of a lot to science, but so much to eco-bullshit.
As in the teaching situation, hard to get the first crack of dawn, isn't it.
Well Ivan, those Post-Hole Diggers seem to have a major influence on the text books I'm using. I guess I'm more interested in improving a crackhead's reading comprehension, or more importantly, getting him to think for himself.
Well said.
Unfortunately I have to agree with the former crackhead. Unless everyone makes a serious effort, individual efforts aren't going to do enough. Years ago I seriously got into environmental issues, did a lot of research, even wrote to world leaders. I realized that the only thing I could change was myself. Now, years later, I'm coming to realize that the changes I'd made have amounted to nothing in the large scheme of things. These days I have little faith in humanity & as such, I feel that the sooner humankind wipes itself out, the better.
Not that I've given up on ALL of my environmental changes, though. I'm just not as strictly rigid about it all as I used to be.
Hey Jim,
I hear you on this one. The story is simple and depressing, just my thing. And sadly, I relate to the crackhead most of all at times.
At least he's aware of his former crack head status. That's fairly bright considering some folks I've met.
This is really touching. It's good that he found something that he's so interested in.
OMG, you caught something OTHER than a catfish?!?!
A good, sad one. Pretty much gets reality in a nutshell. A former crackhead microcosm, as it were.
That's probably how he's felt about his entire life.
Maybe the light you're shining on him Jim will have his future efforts at life making a difference. one can only look to the future for change.
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