A Revelation Of The Method
Jonathan Margolis and connectivity
On the day when I first went to Dr. Carmichael at Columbia Presbyterian Hospital, Agnes Patterson returned to the Spellman School for her regular Thursday volunteer session. She wanted to go and confront me about why I had given her the drawing. She normally volunteered in Ms. Eleanor Davis’s classroom with six nine-year-old children, four boys and two girls. On his day Elizabeth Fox was supposed to have read a Dr. Seuss’ book, The Lorax but she was a “no show.” So, Ms. Davis asked Agnes to read the book to the children.
One of the young girls named Ginny asked her “Where is the Fox lady?”
“It’s not polite,” Ms. Davis said, “Her name is Mrs. Fox, not the ‘Fox lady.’”
“Is something wrong? Is she ill?” Agnes asked Ms. Davis.
“No, as far as I know, she’s at the hospital with Jonathan.”
“Jonathan, that eleven-year-old boy is at the hospital, is he OK?”
“So, you don’t know about what happened?” Ms. Davis said. “It’s been all over the school. Jonathan Margolis threw a fit at the swimming pool and he was taken to the hospital.”
“Is he OK?” Agnes asked.
“I don’t think he was injured.” She paused. “He may be gone for a few days. Why are you asking me about Jonathan?”
“Well, he gave me a drawing the last time I was here. I’m still trying to figure out what it means.”
‘I think you can drive yourself crazy if you think too much about Jonathan’s drawings.” Ms. Davis told her. “Jonathan gave me a drawing a year ago. I think it’s still on my desk. I’d be crazy if I took it seriously. I think it’s still on my desk, first drawing on the top.”
Agnes went to her desk, opened the drawer, and found a folded drawing. She took it out, unfolded it, and looked at it for a moment. It was a drawing of a bridge over a river that passed between two large hills. It appeared to be autumn with the leaves on the trees turning oranges and reds.
“Do you recognize this picture?” Agnes asked her.
“Of course,” she responded. “I fell off that bridge when I was twelve years old, I nearly drowned. This passerby ran into the river and pulled me out. His name was Herbert Holloway.”
“Jonathan gave this to you?” Agnes asked as she held onto the picture.
“What happened to Herbert Holloway?”
“I don’t know what happened to Herbert,” Ms. Davis responded.
“It’s not all Jonathan gave me. I’ll show you the other thing before you leave this afternoon. I think we should read The Lorax to them.”
“Of course,” Agnes answered.
Agnes sat down at the table with the children and began to read The Lorax.
“At the far end of town, where the brickle grass grows,” she began, and she read for about fifteen minutes. Some of the children listened quietly and one boy began to bang his arms on the table and Ms. Davis intervened to quiet the young boy.
“Jackson,” she told him. “Breathe.” But the boy continued to swing his arms.
“Breathe,” she repeated.
At this moment a paraprofessional aide named Adam Brinkmann entered the classroom and approached the table where Jackson was sitting. When Jackson wouldn’t stop banging his arms on the table, Adam spoke in a soft voice, “Tell the boy everything is OK.”
“Everything is OK. Relax Jackson.”
After a few moments, Jackson began to calm down and Adam sat down at the table with the other children. Agnes continued to read The Lorax and Adam listened. When she finished the book and put it away, Adam was still sitting at the table.
“Perhaps you and I can get something to eat,” Adam told her. “I have something I want to tell you.”
“OK,” Agnes responded.
Adam was surprised that she had agreed. After Adam left the classroom, Agnes’ mind then returned to thinking about me again, about what the drawing I gave her might mean. She was one of the few who had paid any attention to my drawings in my almost four years of living at the school.
From my first few weeks at the Spellman School, I had seemingly floated from room to room as a butterfly might, following a pattern which appeared on the surface as both fixed and completely random simultaneously. In my daily routine, I had moved wherever I was directed to move from my room to my classroom to the cafeteria to my room again, in patterns as regular and as predictable as any complex mechanical device, like a clock or a metronome. There was no reason for anyone to take notice of me. I had responded to verbal cues. I had moved wherever I was directed to move. I hadn’t spoken a word. I hadn’t called attention to myself, and most people had simply ignored me. I had always appeared obsessively preoccupied with my drawings. It had been easier to simply allow me to draw than to try to attempt to interact with me. Even my teacher Ms. Davis, for the last part of the day, had let me to occupy myself with whatever I seemed to be drawn to.
How could she communicate with me without words, when I didn’t seem to acknowledge any interactions made to me?
Agnes was not someone who readily co-mingled with her co-workers at the Spellman School. She had a strict rule about workplace social interactions, but she had reluctantly agreed to meet with Adam so he might tell her his story.
After she finished her work in the classroom, on the first day of Jonathan’s absence, Adam arrived at the door carrying a small plastic bag with a package in his left hand.
“I wanted to thank you for agreeing to meet with me on this,” he told her. “I didn’t think there would ever be an opportunity for me to talk to you about this.”
She was already beginning to question her decision to speak to him. She had always shunned these kinds of intrigues before. But she was curious.
“Do you have any special preferences about where we can eat?” He asked her.
“I’m not a persnickety personality,” she responded.
He couldn’t recall anyone having ever used the word ‘persnickety’ with him. This was the first signet of the out-of-the-ordinary interaction between them.
“What about Indian food?” he asked her.
“I’m not opposed to Indian food,” she responded.
“Good. Then I know of a reasonable Indian place about four blocks from the school. It’s a little crowded if you don’t mind a crowd.”
“Crowds don’t bother me,” she responded.
“That’s great.”
She kept looking at the bag he was carrying.
They left the Spellman School together and began to walk on 17th Street east toward Union Square.
“You’ve eaten at this place before?” She asked. “The food is not too spicy?”
“You don’t like spicy food? That surprises me. You don’t come across as one of those white bread and tuna salad kind of people,” he responded.
“What is a white bread and tuna salad person like?” She asked. “I’ve never heard it put that way.”
“There are some people who like everything sedate and predictable and then there are others who like the Samba. I can easily picture you at the ballet.”
“I don’t watch the ballet. I like Pink Floyd and the Rolling Stones,” she responded.
“What about the Samba?” he asked.
“I know the Samba,” she responded.
“See. I know I’m right about you, you’re a ballet dancer who has come to love the Samba.”
She walked ahead of him a couple of steps as they began toward Third Avenue. Adam didn’t say another word to her as they walked when they finally reached the restaurant on 19th Street and Third Avenue, it was crowded with several people standing outside waiting to get in.
Agnes couldn’t remember the last time she had waited outside a restaurant. She was not particularly fond of Italian food, but she didn’t want to reinforce his image of her as a white bread woman, whatever that meant.
She had never thought of herself in this way. She had always considered herself prudent and reflective and she’d always seen these qualities in herself as strengths, not weaknesses.
They both got in line behind the others to wait their turn to enter the restaurant.
“I like Indian food,” Adam told her. “I don’t know why. My mother had a heart problem and we rarely had salt in our food.”
“That should have been healthy for you,” Agnes responded.
“Healthy but not very exciting.”
“So, you’re into excitement, one of those adrenaline junkies,” she noted.
“I guess you could put it that way,” he answered.
“I have the same problem,” she told him. “Loud music and frantic movements. I was a runner as a child. I kept my mother very busy.”
“So how are you now?” He asked her.
“You’re not flirting with me, are you?” she asked.
He was surprised by the boldness of her remark. He didn’t know how to respond to her. A “yes” would convey one message, provocative and potentially disastrous, and a “no” would bring a whole other set of risks. He also knew a hesitant answer would also be problematic. So he said the only thing he knew would have a positive effect.
“I’ve admired you at a distance your work with children for months now. I think when people have ease and comfort in their work, they should be encouraged.”
“So, I guess you’re flirting,” she responded. “Thank you for your kind words. I hope to make myself worthy of them.”
For the next eleven minutes, they didn’t say a word to each other while they quietly waited. Adam opened the bag to stare at its contents a couple of times while Agnes tried to look the other way.
“How long have you been watching me?” She finally asked him. She knew the question was provocative, but then she was more a fan of the Dark Side of the Moon than of a Russian ballet, even though she had danced in ballet as a child. There had always been something of rebel in her, which was part of the reasons that led to her nearly drowning.
“Can I get a clue as to what’s in the bag?” She asked him as they finally reached the door to go inside the restaurant.
“Wait, I think you need the full effect including the story that goes along with it.”
“There’s a story?” she questioned.
“There is always a story. This one has great meaning for me,” Adam responded.
This piqued her interest even more.
When they entered the restaurant it was very crowded with a diverse group of patrons. It was also very noisy.
“I didn’t remember it being this noisy,” he told her. “We can go somewhere else if you like.”
Adam opened the door for her to let her go inside in front of him. They waited another fifteen minutes inside to finally get a table to sit down.
“Kind of crowded,” Adam told her. “The food is very good here.”
“I’d gather that,” she responded.
A young waitress approached their table to take their orders. Adam was looking at a paper menu.
“I’d like this curry vegetable plate,” Adam told her.
Agnes seemed a little flustered.
“I’m not sure what I can order,” she asserted.
“The chickpeas are good,” he recommended.
“OK. The chickpeas then,” Agnes proposed.
“Would you like something to drink?” he asked her.
“Water, just water would be fine,” she answered.
“I’ll have an iced tea and water for my friend,” he told the waitress.
Their waitress left the table.
“I’ve been here a few times before. The food was great,” he encouraged.
“Can you tell me what’s in the bag?” she asked him.
“It comes with a story as I said before,” he answered.
“I used to be with this Chinese girl named Bo. She taught me a lot about China,” Agnes explained.
He laid the plastic bag down on the table beside him.
“So are you ready to hear my story or would you like to wait till the food comes?” he asked.
“What kind of story is it?” she asked.
“A provocative one. It raises a lot of questions if you think about it.”
“How long a story is it?” she asked.
“Not long. Five minutes maybe. But it’s a thoughtful five minutes,” he told her.
“OK. I’m listening,” she responded.
“I’ll say from the beginning that everything I’m about to tell you happened to me not so long ago. You’ll be the first I’ve spoke to about this.”
He took a deep breath and then placed his hands on the tabletop with his fingers touching the tabletop.
“I think we’ve been at the school about the same length and our paths never crossed. I’ve been all over the building for three years now,” he told her.
“I’ve been with the eight-year-old for two years now,” she added.
“I saw you once at the end of a hallway taking someone to Jonathan Margolis’ classroom, ” he acknowledged.
“I was there once. Over a year ago, they asked me to escort one of the children to the classroom for about a minute.” she continued.
“This story is about Dr. Younger who had a heart attack here at the school and I was asked to go with him to the hospital. The ambulance had arrived and the EMTs were taking him down the hallway, Ms. Alexander stopped and told me to go in the ambulance with him. I’d never met Dr. Younger before that day.” Adam paused.
Their waitress returned with their plates and laid them down on the table.
“So let me try to give you the picture here. I’m on this ambulance with Dr. Younger on its way to NYU Langard Hospital on 19th Street. Dr Younger is upset and in a panic. He thinks he’s about to die. He reaches into his pocket and he hands me a book. Tells me he has no one else in his life to pass it on to. He asks me to give it to someone because he thinks he’s going to die. So I agree to give it to someone. Someone says “He or she has to be special, someone truly worthy of having his or her eyes opened. Then he hands me the book in this bag and collapses unconscious.” He paused. “I’ve been carrying this book around with me for weeks, trying to think of whom I might give it to. Then I saw you. So you see this book has already changed my life.”
“What happened to Dr. Younger?” she asked.
“He survived as far as I know. But he has not come back to the Spellman School.”
“What happened when you got to the hospital with him?” she asked.
“They took him away and then sent me home. It seems my contact with him was for just a few minutes for me to deliver this book. I’m kind of glad that this whole episode is finally coming to closure.”
“So can I see the book?” she asked him.
“Of course.”
He reached into the bag and removed a paperback book entitled “LAO TSU — (THE WAY”) Tao Te Ching.
“Chinese Philosophy,” he told her. “Also, a political theory about changing a world.”
“I’ve marked a passage,” he told her.
He opened the book a moment, rifled through the pages and began to read the passage aloud. “Chapter twenty-two. If you want to become whole, let yourself be partial, if you want to become straight, let yourself be crooked. If you want to become full, let yourself be empty. If you want to be reborn, let yourself die. If you want to be given everything, give everything up.” He paused. “This book is yours now.”
“Thank you,” she told him. “I don’t know what to say. Read it, we can talk about it.”
As he began to eat his food, she began to flip through the pages of the book.
“Of all the people you encounter every day, you’ve decided I’m the one who should get this book?” she questioned.
“Yes,” he responded. “That must mean something, right?”
“Yes,” she responded.
“I hope it has some meaning for you,” he told her.
She took the book and put it into her bag. It would be a book which captivated her over the next few weeks.
“Thank you,” she told him.