Easy As Falling Off A Bike pt 2739

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The Daily Dormouse.
(aka Bike, est. 2007)
Part 2739
by Angharad

Copyright© 2015 Angharad

  
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This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
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When I went to collect the girls they were all waiting for me except Trish. On noticing this, I enquired where she was. “She’s in detention,” offered Livvie.

“Oh, what has she done?”

“She was checking a text on her phone in a maths lesson and had her phone confiscated. She argued about it with Sister Theresa and was put in detention.”

“I suppose she’ll do her homework while she’s in there.”

“No, Mummy, you have to sit and stare at a wall.”

“Why, wossit gonna do?” asked Danielle.

“Can we go home now, Mummy?” asked Mima.

“How much longer is she going to be?”

“About twenty minutes, Mummy,” Livvie checked her watch.

“How about we pop and get a milkshake while we wait?” Silly question really, a bit like asking the denomination of the pontiff. The advantage of this place was simply being close to the school, otherwise I wouldn’t enter the place, real greasy spoon establishment. But they enjoyed their milkshakes and we were back two minutes before Trish arrived.

“Ah, here’s the master criminal,” I declared.

“Ha, it was your fault for sending me a text, in the first place.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Well it was, if you hadn’t sent me the text I wouldn’ta been caught and stuck in detention.”

“I heard it was for arguing with the teacher.”

“Well with her you have to, she’s a real cretin.”

“She’s still your teacher and you need to respect that fact.”

“I know more about maths than she does. ‘Once one is one, twice one is two,’ she chanted in a silly voice and Livvie giggled.

“Come on, Moriarty, let’s get home.”

Once at home I took Trish into my study and explained about the call from Dr Rose. “What’s he complaining for? I’m saving him and Dr Stephanie loads a dosh.”

“It isn’t about money, Trish, it’s about you over reaching yourself.”

She raised her arm in the air, “I’m not overreaching, am I?”

“Stop trying to confuse me. I didn’t mean it literally...”

“So why say it then?”

“Because I did, that’s why. Dr Rose has asked me to tell you to stop advising what stuff Charlotte should take to become more girly, and stop encouraging her to transition. It’s none of our business.”

“But she asked me for help, Mummy.”

“I don’t care what she asked you do what I tell you—got that, missy?”

“’S not fair,” she pouted, but then it never is with Trish.

“And you can tell Livvie as well.”

“How d’you know Livvie was helping me?”

“Because I believe she was, wasn’t she?”

“’S not fair,” she grumbled stomping out of my room.

A little later I bumped into Livvie and asked her if Trish had said anything. “Oh yes, Mummy, she talks all the time, especially in school, it’s only because some of the teachers are frightened of her that she doesn’t get into more trouble.”

“The teachers are frightened of her?”

“Well she’s such a brainiac, if they upset her she keeps telling they’ve got their facts wrong and she then tells them what the right answer is.”

“I wonder if she realises that if she really upsets the teachers, the school will expel her and she’d have to go to a council school.”

“Like Danni used to go to?”

“Very possibly that same one.”

“She wouldn’t like that.”

“I don’t suppose she would.”

“Couldn’t you home school her like you did with Danielle?”

“That is very expensive and why should I spend even more money just for her to misbehave?”

“They wouldn’t make her be a boy again, would they?”

“No, but some of the girl’s schools can be quite rough too; some possibly worse than the boys. Ask Hannah if you don’t believe me.”

“Uh, no thanks, Hannah’s old school was horrid.”

I shrugged and let the grapevine do its work for me. I’d just finished a phone call when Trish burst into my room, “Don’t let them send me to Hannah’s old school, please, Mummy.”

“It won’t be up to me.”

“Why, you’re my mother?”

“Yes and I do my bit by sending you to school every day you’re supposed to be there. If the school I used to pay for expels you, you’ll have to go where they can fit you in and that could well be Hannah’s old one.”

“But you mustn’t let them send me there.”

“It isn’t up to me, Trish, it’s up to you, yourself?”

“Don’t be silly, Mummy, how can it be up to me?”

“For the simple fact if you were less arrogant in class there’d be less chance of them expelling you.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” she said haughtily.

“Exactly what you just said and did then. You’re at times a very lovely young woman whilst at others you’re a veritable pain in the neck. It’s only you who’ll spoil it for yourself, thinking you always know better than your elders.”

“I do most of the time...”

“See, you can’t seem to keep your stupid mouth closed.”

“But they are pretty stupid much of the time...”

“Don’t care, carry on like that and you’ll be expelled for being unmanageable. Once you get a reputation for that you’ll always be in trouble.”

“But that’s not fair,” she protested.

“Life isn’t, if it was there wouldn’t be fifty thousand migrants trying to get to England from France for a better life. You have to realise that your arrogance, being a bighead and pointing out people’s mistakes, especially in public is just going to get you thoroughly disliked. You’ll have no friends either, other girls don’t like bigheads.”

“But I’m not a bighead, I just don’t like to see people make mistakes.”

“You make them, so why can’t other people be allowed to?”

“You won’t send me to a council school, will you?”

“I went to one.”

“Is that why you used to get beaten up?”

“Partly.”

“I don’t wanna get beaten up.”

“I told you, if you behave yourself it won’t happen. I also want you to stop contacting Charlotte Murchison, let her mother and the doctors sort her out, all right?”

“Okay—does she go to a council school?”

“I don’t know.”

“What if she contacts me?”

“Just ignore it.”

“But that’s rude, Mummy.”

“Tell her you can’t help at the moment, you’re too busy.”

“But that’s a lie, Mummy.”

“Would you rather tell her the truth that she’s a no hoper who has no chance of ever looking like a girl.”

“Um—she could, Mummy, if only she’d...”

“Don’t you ever learn?”

“Oh—yeah, sozzz.” She skedaddled before I confiscated her legs. I felt exhausted. Why are so many intelligent people so dumb? She presumably has a very straightforward map of the universe and sees no wrong in what she does because she’s ten years old. Sadly it’s so easy to forget that fact which is fundamental to how her mind works. She’s still a baby really and I so often forget.

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Comments

Children as right pains.

I have a son, now 48, who was doing so poorly in school at 12 years old that we took him to a very special child psychologist. The results were that out of about a dozen or so areas he was borderline genius in two areas, reading comprehension and memory. In the rest he was normal or subnormal. He reminds me of Trish because of his stubbornness. Now days I wonder if he would be called high functioning Aspergers or even Autistic. He did not bother to crawl, he just got up and walked.

Now days I understand that a child like that must be encouraged to crawl.

At his age he is sadistic, and sanctimonious. I have despaired of his ever coming round since he has a severe adjustment disorder also. It is a good day when I do not hear from him.

Gwen

Trish Sounds Like My Nephew

jengrl's picture

Trish sounds like my nephew . He's way ahead of the other kids in his class and my brother and sister-in-law sometimes worry that he isn't challenged enough to maintain interest in class . Trish sounds like a candidate for an accelerated learning program that challenges her mind more.

Being a convent school, they are more closely tied to biblical scripture instead of scientific theory . She is all about Quantum Theory and other concepts that fly in the face of biblical narratives. In a very real way, she's more her mother's daughter , due to Cathy's understanding of the biological sciences , her disdain for creationist theories taught by the church and her belief in evolution . It's another great chapter!

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Jengri, Your Suggestion is Much Better !

Meaning, that I like it better than the previous one. I was a wee bit like Trish when I was a small child - I learned to read in one afternoon, taught by my Uncle who was a pianist and composer, and who was recently let out of prison because he was a Conscientious Objector, who refused to be 'called up' into the British Army after Britain declared war on Germany in 1939. He was first sent down the coal mines, but he was far from strong and robust and the air down there made him seriously ill with his lungs, so they put him in prison for a month and then invited him to join the army again but he still refused to. So they gave up and he finally was engaged to work for a Trade Union. My Mummy was a concert pianist too, and he used to visit us at weekends. He was reading the News of the World, a Sunday paper in England that only a year ago closed down - even back in 1940 it was a paper with little news and lots of scandal, but it was popular with working class families and that is what we were. I remember vary clearly what he said as he was reading it out loud to my Mummy - "IT says here that..." My inquisitive little ears went up like my pet rabbit's and I rushed over to him aasking "Where does it say that?" and he showed me the black stuff on the white paper, "These are letters, and they make words, see?" and in one afternoon, I was taught how to read. A few weeks later, my Mummy took me to the Public Library, about 1 and a half miles away, to see about me getting a Library Ticket. She was then called up to work in a Munitions Factory, and so I was taken to a "Nursery School", in a nearby Village Hall. As I was not quite 4 yet I was put in with the Babies, where toddlers and babies were put and where they had to sleep in the afternoons and play with toys. Well I threw a tantrum and demanded to be in with the bigger kids, declaring that I was NOT a baby - I could READ ! Of course the ladies, volunteers who were not trained at all and not teachers, did not believe me so finally they gave me a paperback book with no pictures and tiny writing in it, and a picture on the front of a doctor and a nurse with red heart shapes on it, and demanded that I prove my claim. Oh how shocked they were when I read at high spead without any mistakes about three pages of it ! *Bloody Hell " He CAN read ! We better put him with the bigger ones" one said and that is what they did. I was very unpopular with the 4-5 years olds, because I could read better than they could and this was regarded as unfair. My Mummy became pregnant again with my baby sister so she was released from working in the factory. I used to walk to the Library and back, on my own, twice a week, taking out the maximum allowed 3 books, and worked my way along the shelves from left to right and then up a shelf, until I had read ALL the books in the childrens' section, so I asked the Librarian, who had become friends with me, if I could start on the books in the Adult section. She allowed me to do that, but only non-fiction and she said she might have to take a book away from me if it seemed too difficult or bad for a small child. So by the time I was allowe to go to what they called the Infants School, at 5, I was quite informed about astronomy, biology, chemistry, physics and even mathematics.

More trouble, just like Angharad's Trish, though not quite as bright as she of course, I often knew batter than the teachers during lessons and when they said something wrong I was always there to correct them. I was ostracised by the other children and not liked by the teachers. I was an awkward kid, for example I was writing with my left hand, but the ink wells were in the top right hand corner of the desks, and it was easy to bring a dripping nib over the paper I was writing on, and the teachers, who were mostly very old ladies who had retired from teaching but who were brought back because all the real teachers had gone to help the war effort, were very angry with me. Once my left arm was tied behind my back and I was FORCED to use my right hand instead. I also had a dunces hat put on my head and was made to stand in the corner in front of the class. At one time I remember nobody wanted to play with me, but I did have a pet dog, called Rover, who at this time was my only friend, and he used to walk to school with me and sit outside, looking at me through the window, and when play time came I used to go over to him and we played together. This school, the only one apart from expensive private ones for posh kids, for miles around, belonged to the Church of England, so every morning we had to go into the Hall and listen to prayers and a rding from this big black book and sing a hymn. My Mum and Dad had belonged to different religions and when they married and had me they were both licked out of their respective families, so they decided that if that wa how religious people behaved they would bring me (and my sister) up with NO religion, so I complained about all this praying and stuff. Even when we went back into our classrooms we first had a lesson on Christianity, learning something they called a Catty Chasm, learning all that nonsense by heart, getting the children ready to be "confirmed".

I remember one teacher losing her temper with this dimwitted boy who sat 2 desks away from mine, where she was screaming at him "What is god ?" Wham! swiping round his head, "God is love !" repeatedly. I am so glad I was raised an Atheist. Even at the Grammar School I went to, I was an outsider for the first few years. It was not until I began to start Puberty that i slowly learned that showing off all that I knew, and telling teachers when they were wrong, was not
a clever thing to do ! I made my early life much tougher than it need have been. Looking back now, I can recognise that I had what is now called Aspergers Syndrome, but it had not been invented back then. BTW, in the latest edition of that big American book that lists EVERY Psychological condition known, Asperger's is no longer classed within the Autistic spectrum.

My elder Grandson, who is also afflicted like I was, and who now is just under 30, tells me he thinks it is just the next step in human evolution. He has an eidetic memory, is a fantastic witness to have in court as he recalls events in minute detail and is physically unable to tell a lie.

It was the Soviets, of all peoples, who selected the extra bright kids and put them in schools together where they did accelerated learning. They created an elite who achieved a lot in several sciences and areas of engineering, despite having far less money than the West and being cut off from full information exchange during the Cold War. What actually finished them off was that they were conned into believing the USA when they claimed to have developed space based x-ray and gamma-ray laser weapons to give the Americans a total defence against rockets and the ability to wipe out any weapons inside the Soviet sphere. This was a gross exaggeration, but was believed, through fear, and their much smaller economy collapsed under the strain of committing so much to its "defence" and trying to keep up.

Their long-suffering people had put up with enough "Austerity" and just would not play the game any more. Certain UK politicians of today might consider it prudent to ponder that.

Briar

Trish Sounds Like My Nephew

jengrl's picture

Trish sounds like my nephew . He's way ahead of the other kids in his class and my brother and sister-in-law sometimes worry that he isn't challenged enough to maintain interest in class . Trish sounds like a candidate for an accelerated learning program that challenges her mind more.

Being a convent school, they are more closely tied to biblical scripture instead of scientific theory . She is all about Quantum Theory and other concepts that fly in the face of biblical narratives. In a very real way, she's more her mother's daughter , due to Cathy's understanding of the biological sciences , her disdain for creationist theories taught by the church and her belief in evolution . It's another great chapter!

PICT0013_1_0.jpg

Sticks and carrots

Rhona McCloud's picture

Imposing boundaries on any childs behaviour is difficult but from the first red shoes enticement and iPad confiscation Cathy has done well with Trish. Now however the time has come when the sticks Cathy can realistically use are losing their power so I think what is needed is a bigger carrot. It occurs to me that an area unexplored in EAFOAB is music… Trish guitar shredding or emulating Yo-Yo Ma's Bach epic…? Just so long as it isn't Beyoncé!!

It won't be cheap as for instance it cost me four lawn mowers to create one mechanic who still won’t cut the grass.

Rhona McCloud

Trish actually sounds like

Trish actually sounds like she is bored beyond tears in school. Do the schools in the UK have Advanced Placement (AP) classes? She seems like a really good candidate for them. If no AP classes, then how about moving her up a few forms (grades) to where she is really challenged in her thinking?

Slight problem with skipping grades...

We also have to consider Trish's emotional maturity and interpersonal skills, which I dare say are a bit below grade level.

Takes me back to my elementary school days. I entered kindergarden at age 4, already a year ahead of schedule.

When I was in second grade, my teacher left the school after a month or so. I was promoted to third grade with my mother objecting, from what she told me.

My third grade teacher was a great woman (probably second best at the school behind my kindergarden teacher, looking back), but neither of us really knew what to do with each other.

At the end of the school year, the principal was insisting I move on to fourth grade. My mother would have none of that. She pulled me out, enrolled me in a private school, and had me repeat third grade.

Looking back, it was a good decision; I still feel I was "behind" in emotional/interpersonal skills even after repeating third grade, and still am to this day.

There's more to school than just book learning. I'd personally look into a Boys & Girls Club (or whatever the equivalent is in the UK) to have the children spend some time at after school. More for Trish's benefit and sending the other kids so Trish doesn't feel "singled out".

Part of the problem

is Trish Emotional Intelligence is way behind her cognitive intelligence. It is going to get her into trouble. I really think she needs therapy on the subject, just so she can understand a little.

Intelligence will 'out' -

usually beneficially if it's nurtured and tended properly.
Just look out if it's warped by the wrong treatment in early life.

Still lovin' it Ang.

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