THE GIFT OF SELF CONTROL

“Self-control is twice as important as intelligence in predicting academic achievement.”

THE GIFT OF SELF-CONTROL

SOME COMMON SENSE GUIDES TO RAISING SUCCESSFUL CHILDREN

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THE DEVELOPMENT OF RUHALA LEARNING

Please, while reading this paper, place the stress on the first syllable in the words “self-control”. While unnatural and foreign it will vigilantly remind us that self means not under others control, only one possible kind of control here: self.

“In any culture, the development of self-control is crucial. This ability, which depends on the prefrontal cortex, provides the basis for mental flexibility, social skills and discipline. It predicts success in education, career and marriage. Indeed, childhood self-control is twice as important as intelligence in predicting academic achievement. Conversely, poor self-control in elementary school increases the risk of adult financial difficulties, criminal behavior, single parenthood and drug dependence,” so state Sandra Aamodt, a former editor in chief of Nature Neuroscience, and Sam Wang, an associate professor of molecular biology and neuroscience at Princeton. Sandra and Sam are the authors of Welcome to Your Child’s Brain: How the Mind Grows From Conception to College.

Ms. Aamodt and Mr. Wang will be quoted in this paper extensively from an op-ed piece they wrote in the New York Times, February 19, 2012. [UNLESS OTHERSISE REFERENCED, ALL QUOTES BELOW ARE FROM THIS OP-ED PIECE.]

Here is the link to the full article: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/19/opinion/sunday/building-self-control-the-american-way.html?src=me&ref=general

Mark Ruhala began teaching children full-time in 1988 and founded his own learning center Mark Ruhala’Studio in 1991, which transformed into the Broadway Training Center in 1996 and is still serving the children and youth of Westchester, New York today. In 2004 Ruhala founded The Gate: Gateway to the Arts through Transformational Energy, which transformed into the Ruhala Center. Throughout this quarter century Ruhala has expanded upon his original teaching philosophy of “theatre as a vehicle for personal development” and created Ruhala Learning: a method aiming for optimal learning and development. Ruhala Learning has been greatly influenced by educational author John Holt and his common sense philosophy: “…the human animal is a learning animal; we like to learn; we are good at it. What kills the processes are the people interfering with it or trying to regulate it or control it.” Also author and award winning teacher John Taylor Gatto has been an inspiration to Ruhala Learning with his extensive writing and lecturing based on a simple idea “When you take the free will out of education, that turns it into schooling.” ― John Taylor Gatto

What follows is a break down of the scientific opinions provided by Aamodt and Wang, provided in italic “quotes” , a hyphen and A&W, then the connections to the Ruhala Learning model which follows.

“Like many brain capacities, self-control can be built through practice.” - A&W. What is wonderful is that science is now catching up with common sense. Mothers and care givers have known throughout history that how a child is raised makes a significant difference. Yet, in the past few decades we have been directed by doctors to believe that our brains need drugs to overcome their inborn deficits; that our DNA is so hard-wired that we really have little say past what we are born with. Ruhala has been critical of the bio-pharmological psychiatric pushing of drugs on children which are mostly untested or under tested at best. Ruhala agrees with Dr. Peter Breggin, author of The War Against Children, ”Because children are among our most vulnerable and treasured citizens, we especially need to protect them from psychiatric diagnoses and drugs. We need to offer them the family life, education and moral and spiritual guidance that will help them to fulfill their potential as children and adults.” The environment a child lives in is much more the cause of brain deficits than inborn chemical imbalances. Ruhala Learning works to make changes in the child’s synaptic brain firing by creating healthy habits and practices through learning self-control.

“Fortunately for American parents, psychologists find that children can learn self-control without externally imposed pressure. Behavior is powerfully shaped not only by parents or teachers but also by children themselves. The key is to harness the child’s own drives for play, social interaction and other rewards. Enjoyable activities elicit dopamine release to enhance learning, while reducing the secretion of stress hormones, which can impede learning and increase anxiety, sometimes for years.” – A&W. We can go even further and remind ourselves of the many scientific studies which have shown that when a mother and newborn child do not immediately meet at the breast seconds after birth, overwhelming stress overcomes both. The result being that the mother’s emotional, physical, and psychic expectation to nurse her child, as women have been doing for thousands of years in a natural continuum, and the child’s same ontological expectation, are not fulfilled and the most important moment for oxytocin, well known as the “love” hormone, to fill the pair with bliss is lost forever. All children are gifted a huge advantage to begin their lives with the mother love and bonding that comes from womb-to-breast intimacy.

Ruhala’s own children were born at home in natural drug-free child birth aiming to begin their children’s lives with little secretion of stress hormones and maximal secretion of “love” hormones. Ms. Celina Ruhala, Ruhala’s wife, aided herself by retraining her brain patterns and thought conditioning with a beautiful therapist who used hypnotherapy to undo the old ideas about childbirth pain and fear, replacing them with fresh insights and healthier ideas. Childbirth is a human’s first orientation to life outside the womb. It can be filled with the unnatural sterile environment accompanied by many “expert” strangers who are trained to medicate and have little trust in the innate wisdom of the human body and the mother’s instinct. Or birthing can be ease-filled with loved ones close to assist, a water source to allow the mother and baby to relax, with home-cooked nutrition, the comfort and privacy of home, and a midwife who is not an “expert” but is expert at letting a mother deliver her baby and to intervene if and only when necessary. For why do we exactly begin our children’s lives in the inherent stress of a hospital where an expecting mother is treated like a patient, a sick person?

Ruhala Learning is based in child-driven learning, the most stress-free learning available: it is built on the idea that children develop by using their brains and that there is a significant difference in how the brain functions when following orders as opposed to leading oneself. John Taylor Gatto urges us “… to examine in your own mind the assumptions which must lay behind using the police power to insist that once-sovereign spirits have no choice but to submit to being schooled by strangers.” The stress of schools is responsible for many childhood perversions. Children rarely want strangers to order them what to do with the threat of punishment. What costs do children pay to acclimate and make this absurdity okay?

If the key is to “harness the child’s own drive for play…” then we must recognize that coercing our children to do what we want them to do can be very stressful for them, while letting them do what they want can elicit valuable dopamine to enhance learning. This is not a recipe to allow children total freedom; rather it is a guide that Ruhala Learning follows. Teaching children who are doing what they want requires much less effort and gets much more results. This is evident to anyone who teaches children. Most often, the self-directed child in the midst of their chosen activity needs little intervention at all. They figure out for themselves what they need to learn. In many Ruhala classrooms children need little from the instructor other than to get out of the way and witness the self motivated learning that is taking place. Actually a scary proposition for teachers of traditional models that are taught they must teach the child for it to learn anything.

“Young children build self-control through elaborate, imaginative games like pretending to be a doctor or a fireman.” – A&W. Theatre games, a major tool of Ruhala Learning, are a direct link to the “elaborate and imaginative games” which build self-control. Perhaps this is why so many children would rather play theatre games in a creative acting class than actually learn skills and gain knowledge about acting by listening to the teacher. Over the years it has taken Ruhala time to realize why children desire this so, as he too would rather “teach” them what he knows and what he knows they need to know to become an actor. In fact they are teaching themselves when they are playing the games Ruhala facilitates – this was what he learned. But as a “teacher” he felt like he was doing nothing when he let them simply keep playing without intervening. But reality is, as Ruhala finally learned, they are learning in the absolute optimal way: through first-hand, direct experience without any teacher. As John Holt articulated so clearly, “the most important thing any teacher has to learn, not to be learned in any school of education I ever heard of, can be expressed in seven words: Learning is not the product of teaching. Learning is the product of the activity of learners.”

After the school day is over, children seem to need to balance all the left brain coerced behavior and learning by letting loose, which actually translates to freeing themselves to do what they want: to be impulsive. Coming to Ruhala theatre classes after school they do not lean towards “learning” because they love the improvisational exercises so much; so much so that they could play these games all year long without ever doing any other theatre exercises. In these games they are experiencing Ruhala Learning: completely self-directed, relating to each other with full focus and participation, giving and taking easily, listening and reacting effortlessly, fully engaged in the imaginary circumstances, living out fantasy after fantasy. What could be more fun?! And now, get this, the experts are telling us that studies show this is the best way towards self-control which will breed success for their futures!

“Frequent practice is crucial. Montessori preschool instruction, which has been shown to lead to strong academic achievement, incorporates self-control into daily activities.” – A&W. Dr. Maria Montessori knew, over a hundred years ago, that self-control is one of the most desirable qualities in children and she based her entire program upon this principle as its foundation. To walk into a true Montessori classroom is to enter a freedom room: children of many ages all together freely doing what they want within the confines of the activities and structure presented to them. The room is filled with the silent whispers of people busy at work in-joying themselves. Montessori believed so strongly in the self-determination of the child that she advocated putting their mattress on the floor and allowing the child to decide when it would sleep and when it would wake. As much as that would alleviate the stress children often feel in going to bed at a certain hour, the stress would transfer over to the parents who would have little idea how to trust this radical proposition! And yet the self-regulation that Dr. Montessori advocates innately teaches the young person to listen to and trust their bodies, which is essential for self-control.

Given this scientific validation of Montessori education Ruhala wonders what stops the Department of Education from at least integrating this proven model into public education. Why, with all the talk of educational reform over the past few decades in this country, hasn’t there been any integration of alternative models of education which have proven effective -models like Montessori, Steiner’s Waldorf model, the Sudbury Valley school, Summerhill, or any of the many models that have already established themselves as hallmarks of good education, which now include the internet programs such as Khan Academy? This simple question begs research, and when one does the research one discovers that the Department of Education is motivated by an idea that children are to become the next workers in the marketplace and therefore ought not be more than order-takers; not critical thinkers who might disrupt the status quo. This serves the industrial/business/corporate/ military needs of the powers that be and keep a class of peoples ready to submit to the poor and often inhumane workplace environment. Just researching the realities of how text books are prepared and marketed is enough to show one how business-driven is the backbone of education. It is not driven by higher ideals of empowering and enabling our young people toward self-discovery, liberal open-mindedness, critical reasoning, creative thinking, and a free-flow of give-and-take with others that leads to a community of learners who share (which is not cheating in the “real world” but is considered so in school) and develop bonds of common interest which reside in a peaceful heart. Ruhala Learning chooses the latter motivation. Again John Holt: “Education…now seems to me perhaps the most authoritarian and dangerous of all the social inventions of mankind. It is the deepest foundation of the modern slave state, in which most people feel themselves to be nothing but producers, consumers, spectators, and ‘fans,’ driven more and more in all parts of their lives, by greed, envy, and fear. My concern is not to improve ‘education’ but to do away with it, to end the ugly and antihuman business of people-shaping and to allow and help people shape themselves.” Mr. Holt saw with his students, as Ruhala has seen all too often himself with his own students, that the dominating emotion of students is fear- fear of being wrong, of being laughed at, made fun of, bullied, not being good enough, not pleasing teachers and parents, not being popular, let alone the fear of getting in trouble by doing what one wants and not conforming. In a recent autobiography the fine and accomplished American actor John Lithgow describes The Stockbridge School, one of many schools he attended in his itinerate youth, because it struck him so differently than others… “This was not your typical New England prep school, full of children of great wealth and patrician breeding. Oh no. With its renegade faculty and its raffish student body, The Stockbridge School was just the opposite. Its kids were roughly divided into two groups. Half were lefty New Yorkers, many of them Jewish and many of them children of divorce. The other half was a polyglot mix of foreign students, in keeping with Hans Maeder’s international mission (the United Nations flag flew along side Old Glory at the school’s entrance). An ultra-liberal, ultra-casual atmosphere prevailed. Dress codes were non-existent. Every teacher was called by his or her first name. Folk ballads and union songs filled the air. The eighty-plus students were made to feel part of a huge, mutually supportive family, in many cases replacing the fractured families they had left behind. The school shut down many years ago, unable to survive after the messianic Hans departed the scene. But while it lasted, it was an artsy, outdoorsy, gloriously anarchic mess of a place…”. Mr. Lithgow goes on to admit that the day he graduated Harvard university, years later, with honors, that he felt he had gotten away with murder – he never finished any reading assignments, not one, and he created an independent-study program of which he never once opened the book but passed none-the-less! This is exactly what schools create: false, phony government-sanctioned learning that offers a degree that one can take and get a job with when little or no learning actually took place. Another student of Ruhala’s, after graduating from Harvard, said she didn’t learn anything there. Far from the exception, this is the ubiquitous message Ruhala hears from students continuously. Who are we kidding? Is this self-control or is this coerced conformism that breeds another actor in the workplace who has yet to figure out they are not fulfilling their potential?

“Aerobic exercise, which increases prefrontal cortex activity, is another way to build cognitive flexibility. Further benefits may come from Asian practices that require sustained attention and disciplined action, like martial arts, yoga and meditation. Though parents often worry that physical education takes time away from the classroom, an analysis of multiple studies instead found strong evidence that physical activity improved academic performance.” – A&W. Anyone who has taken a break from their studies to go enjoy some exercise or sport knows that upon return to the study, rejuvenation and refreshment accompany one back. Hence, a renewed sense of confidence and vitality to wrestle with the difficulties of one’s subject matter. The “further benefits” obtained by “disciplined” practices of martial arts, yoga, and meditation have been woven into the Ruhala Learning model for decades. The Ruhala Learning extension reaches farther with Brain Gym, Heart-Centered meditation, the 5 Rhythm Wave dancing of Gabrielle Roth, already mentioned theatre games and Improv, and the precepts of Holistic Health and Fitness which Ruhala has been developing over the years.

Critical in this Ruhala Learning model is discipline – which is another way of speaking about self-control. Although some students and families may criticize the Ruhala Learning model for a perceived harshness and coarseness around its edges, this is really a misunderstanding that Ruhala insists on self-management and self-control as a prerequisite to being in the classroom. When it is not present, Ruhala philosophy asks for intervention from the instructor to implement this foundation of real learning. Implementation is never enjoyable for the out-of-control child and is therefore often misunderstood and construed to be punishment. With Ruhala’s philosophy that a classroom is a community and a team that works together, the intervention is done in an open and public way, just as is praise, to reinforce the fact that we are responsible to our peers and teammates in the classroom. In this way the team is driven by open, clear purpose which all share equally, and support one another thereof. But today’s protocol in schools insists that “problems” in the classroom be dealt with one-on-one in a private way which separates the behavior from the context and eliminates the possibility of shared learning and support from teammates, along with open accountability. Ruhala Ensemble programs have been successful over the years precisely because the team is built and strengthened in the open with group consciousness.

“The connection between self-control and social skills seems to be a two-way street. Helping children to identify their emotions and think through possible consequences before reacting improves self-control, in the classroom and at home.” – A&W. The arts are based in self expression and therefore inherently assist one in “identifying (their) emotion” by releasing it and not pushing it down and suppressing one’s feelings. Vigilant to the idea that a classroom is a team, social skills are practiced in each and every moment, as children learn to listen and react to one another as teammates and not seen as competitors who stand in the way of one’s succeeding to the top. When the goal is for the team to reach the top, no child is left behind. Ruhala learning is infused in these principles and creates memorable performances lighted by the invisible threads of team mentality. The group makes each individual stronger and makes each actor seem more talented than they are in fact – what a wonderful way to be supported by your team! When a team wins all the players are stars, not just the great players, but even good and the mediocre players. Ruhala will take a team chock full of good players who know how to play together with purpose over a team with great players who play individualistically. Any day.

“Children do not benefit from routine empty praise, like the cries of “Good job!” that ring out over American playgrounds.” – A&W. Ruhala classrooms are notorious for having direct, critical language that can seem utterly insensitive. Yet those on the team “get” the reasoning and motivation behind the “notes” being given and learn to understand none of it is intended to be taken personally. Children become young professionals and learn the objectivity of hearing criticism without personal reaction – and they love it when they do get it because they feel liberated from their personal reactions and not controlled by them. They in fact practice self-control in this way and feel good within themselves from the trusted structure. When praise is in fact heard, the children know its truth as it resonates with what is actually going on in the class work and not “empty”. Ruhala has been driven by the idea that self-esteem is born through accomplishment and not other-directed praise. Therefore work ethic is taught and soon the child understands that through work the greatest reward is inner self-satisfaction. Too often parents and teachers, with loving intention, shower so much praise that the child is unintentionally hurt by it because it does not support reality. The day the child sees the true reality, the child is thwarted. Children know truth; they feel it instinctively in their bodies. And although they may come to override that intuitive sense with coerced pressures, the truth remains in their bodies. That makes it vital for children to work with body workers, chiropractors, acupuncturists, masseuses, cranio-sacral therapists, etc.. – this is a very overlooked aspect of children’s health and much unneeded suffering occurs thereof.

“More effective is to praise a child for effort. “You’re so smart!” doesn’t suggest what to do next time; “Wow, you kept working on that math problem until you got it right!” carries a clear message about the desired behavior. Communicating high but achievable expectations confers tools for real success — the best route to true self-esteem.” – A&W. Ruhala Learning uses clear communication about both desired and undesired behaviors. The group, team setting makes the communication even clearer as it is witnessed and heard by all and can be reinforced by the group. “Communicating high but achievable expectations” does “confer tools for real success” but doesn’t go far enough unless the methods for achieving those expectations are clear and realistic. “When I communicate my expectation that a child actor face front toward the audience and they continually do not do so, I must look at my communication and see where I have not communicated the method for the actor to do so,” Ruhala states. “It seems easy and natural to me to face front, and it would be easy to blame the child for ‘not getting it’, but when I in fact find the way to get them to understand HOW to face front and act, I realize the problem was in my deficient communication and not with the ‘slow’ student. As my voice teacher used to say, it is never the student’s fault, it is my fault if the student isn’t getting it. And one of my dance teachers used to say she could make a stone dance, “ Ruhala finished. Serious teachers hold themselves responsible for a student’s success. High expectations for the student simply reflect the teachers own expectation. As the old adage says: to see the character of the person look to the fruits of his labor.

“An internally motivated approach to building self-control plays to traditional American strengths. Being self-motivated may lead to other positive long-term consequences as well, like independence of thought and willingness to speak out.” – A&W. The grave danger and scary proposition today is that when children have “independence of thought” and a “willingness to speak out”, these “American strengths” become a source of trouble making and are not respected with the sense of liberty they once were. To succeed today is to conform more strictly than ever to the norms imposed by the authorities of school, government, and the police/military. Ruhala Learning adheres dearly to the original American patriotic value of individual liberty. Yet it is couched in the “team” thinking that keeps the individuality in check by maintaining accountability to the whole, the group, the team. Balance is struck and accord is reached and community is served. The last place to look for self-motivation is in schools. Even the driven kids, the over achievers, the gifted students, they all are motivated by an outside force be it parents, bribes, school rewards or punishments, etc…To prove the point, simply imagine taking away the rewards and punishments of schools and imagine what would occur. I imagine the students would be lost and it would take some time to reorient themselves to what real learning is – a self-driven journey for the fun and joy and wonder of it.

Just recently, in March 2012, a Council on Foreign Relations Independent Task Force report states that American public education is a threat to national security -(http://www.cfr.org/united-states/us-education-reform-national-security/p27618). Also in March, President Obama quietly signed into law The National Defense Resources Preparedness Executive Order -

(http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2012/03/16/executive-order-national-defense-resources-preparedness) which allows the president and the Secretary of each Department to seize control of all resources including property, labor, food and water, et.al. even during peacetime. The stage is set, for anyone who wishes to see and connect the dots, such as the passage of so many laws like HR 347 (http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BILLS-112hr347enr/pdf/BILLS-112hr347enr.pdf) that restrict people from protesting, that we are in a dire situation of losing any real liberty and freedom as Americans.

“Helping your children learn to manage themselves, rather than rely on external orders, could pay big dividends in adulthood. With a little luck, they may end up agreeing with the legendarily hard-striving Thomas Edison: “I think work is the world’s greatest fun.” – A&W. The farthest reaches of Ruhala Learning takes from the rich American tradition of independent, self-directed, libertarian education; unschooling, as proposed by the great independent thinker John Holt. Mr. Holt stated, “I want to make clear that I don’t see homeschooling as some kind of answer to badness of schools. I think that the home is the proper base for exploration of the world which we call learning or education. Home would be the best base no matter how good the schools were.” Ruhala Learning has also been very influenced by author John Taylor Gatto who after decades of teaching and winning the Teacher of the Year Award in New York advocated that kids leave school to be homeschooled. “I've noticed a fascinating phenomenon in my thirty years of teaching: schools and schooling are increasingly irrelevant to the great enterprises of the planet. No one believes anymore that scientists are trained in science classes or politicians in civics classes or poets in English classes. The truth is that schools don't really teach anything except how to obey orders. This is a great mystery to me because thousands of humane, caring people work in schools as teachers and aides and administrators, but the abstract logic of the institution overwhelms their individual contributions. Although teachers do care and do work very, very hard, the institution is psychopathic -- it has no conscience. It rings a bell and the young man in the middle of writing a poem must close his notebook and move to a different cell where he must memorize that humans and monkeys derive from a common ancestor.”
― John Taylor Gatto, Dumbing Us Down: The Hidden Curriculum of Compulsory Education

As parents, Celina and Mark Ruhala desire to help their children “learn to mange themselves” because they too believe their children will be payed “big dividends in adulthood” thereof. So their children learn in a self-directed way without any set curriculum other than the guiding principles outlined above and a strong sense of love of reading, which will make one literate enough to learn anything one desires to. Having never had a reading lesson in his life, son Jordan finished all seven of the Harry Potter books in two months, totally driven by his own desire, as a nine year old. He was just assessed by a professional to be reading at high-school level at ten years old. Even though he is not being fed a diet of forced social studies, history, or other academic exercises, he will always be able to learn what he wants because his reading is excellent and his self desire is high. Whatever he does read he retains, unlike most of us that go to school – we learn to forget the material as soon as the test is over so we can move on to the next short-term memory exercise that will be tested. An example of this reality can illuminate: Mr. Ruhala was offering his son Thomas a lesson in fire safety and asked him what makes fire burn. He said air; his brother said more specifically oxygen and then went on to tell us that air has 78% nitrogen, 21% oxygen and 1% water vapor and other stuff. Ruhala was impressed and later that night told his students in a musical theatre class. They all immediately said that he was wrong that there isn’t that much nitrogen. Ruhala had them look it up on their iphones. They were wrong, Jordan was right. They were high-school and college students and graduates, Jordan ten. Jordan is not special or gifted; Jordan has simply had experiences that allow him to learn on his own, all by himself. All children can do this if given the gift. All children are smart, bright, intuitive, and able. The most despicable aspect of schools is that we allow children to fail. No child ought to ever fail. In reality, as noted above, teachers fail, not students. Unfortunately we look the other way.

Ruhala’s children’s health is maintained through self-managed diet (food issues are not created), daily exercise (the basics: push-ups, sit-ups, and squats), brain exercises (Brain Gym and lots of math), with knowledge of homeopathic medicine (they ask for the medicine by name), hands-on-healing (Reiki, which they have learned from there own care) , chiropractic medicine (they love Dr. Dory and ask for her when their bodies are out of alignment), herbal medicine (they know the herbs they need to alkalize), and gardening (a favorite family pastime). They cook for themselves, do their own laundry, clean house, tend the garden, and assist in every activity their parents undertake. The boys play organized sports and learn more excellent social skills while being part of a team. They learn about sportsmanship and the spirit of competition, healthy competition. They grow and live in the world they will be adults in – not in a homogenized, age-divided, one-size-fits-all approach that must be conformed to. They are taught about the real world that they will have to live in as adults and understand the choices they will need to make when time comes. They know what they will need to accomplish to get into a fine university program as home schoolers, should they desire to. It is a constant solo path because there is almost no validation of this lifestyle. But this is also a source of strength and reminds them to have “backbone”, “thick skin” and a “strong sense of character” – all traditional patriotic American values. “Character on and off the stage” has been the Ruhala Learning way since 1991.

Ruhala thinks if he can re-claim children as the magical, self-learning, imaginative, self-regulating, creative, intuitive, resourceful, stress-free, vibrant and radiant beings they are, …anyone can. It just takes will. And it involves thinking traditionally American values of self determination and liberty to live and let live. Neither Ruhala is a college graduate. Both are autodidacts and serious thinking people. All people are. All that is necessary is will. Ruhala doesn’t believe he is special, nor his wife, nor his children. All human beings are special. And all are part of the intricate and interwoven web of humanity that is errantly placed at the center of the eco-system while it actually belongs somewhere on the periphery, in its right order. When we recognize the true station of human beings is a rather primitive one, compared to the vast unknown, the innate humbling quality of the experience allows one to think openly towards more cooperative and interconnected ways; which is, in fact, our true natures. Charles Darwin placed a much greater emphasis on cooperation as our true natures rather than competition. But those who popularized his work, including Aldous Huxley, were determined to stress competition. And the reason for that would be another paper altogether, save to say that our educational and parenting experts have, and always have had, agendas to serve which do not always allow for truthfulness. Yet common sense tells us that without cooperation as a very strong piece of human nature human beings would never have survived.

The gift of self-control illustrates that one can think for herself and see through the double-speak, group-think, official conditioning of mass media and education and discover, if fortunate, that in fact “love is all we need”. Imagine…

Ruhala Performing Arts Center

March 2012

The History Lesson - A New Play

The History Lesson

Written By Mark Ruhala

Copyright © July 2011

Cast of Characters

(in order of appearance)

Mr. Mitchell – 50, professional dance instructor, affable, strict, penetrating

Scott Walker – 17, handsome high school senior, independent thinker, self-contained

Tom Pence – 32, high school history teacher, open-minded, compassionate

Frank Walker – 60, ex-marine, conservative, strong, old-fashioned father, engineer

Mrs. Saxon – 40, elegant, composed, all-business, singing teacher

Gabrielle Granger – 17, charming, pretty, intelligent, self-confident

Whitney Gates-Pence – 33, administrative manager, grounded, loving, assertive

Father Joe – 50, catholic priest, open and easily accessible, affable

Setting

Ann Arbor, Michigan

January, 2011

Scene 1

(in a dance studio/private ballet lesson

(Scott executes degage combination at barre, finishes )

Mr. Mitchell: Think! …other side.

(Scott executes other side and struggles through it)

Mr. Mitchell: Think Scott! What is the pattern?

Scott: Front side front side side front…

Mr. Mitchell: Side

Scott: Side

Mr. Mitchell: Side side side

Scott: Side side side, three side

Mr. Mitchell: Front back, close

Scott: Right, okay.

Mr. Mitchell: Say it.

Scott: Front Side…

Mr. Mitchell: With your hands

Scott: (using hands) front side front side side side front back close

Mr. Mitchell: reverse

Scott: (using hands again) back side back side side side back front close, detourne.

Mr. Mitchell: Right. Do it again.

(Scott does combination correctly this time)

Mr. Mitchell: So what was your problem?

Scott: I couldn’t get my leg to go side three times.

Mr. Mitchell: Why?

Scott: I was thinking it was two.

Mr. Mitchell: So your thinking was the problem.

Scott: Yes.

Mr. Mitchell: Now then, investigate your thinking. Why did you think like that? What mechanism in your thinking took you in the wrong direction?

Scott: I’m used to two side cause we normally do it that way.

Mr. Mitchell: There is no normal.

Scott: (humorously) I should know that.

Mr. Mitchell: Neither of us are normal, normal doesn’t exist. There are norms we follow but they are far from normal. The only norm worth looking into in dance is the freedom of movement that is the norm all great dancing emerges from. Your thinking mechanism was an old idea that needs to be replaced. Rephrase the thought.

Scott: Stay true to the moment, move from what is.

Mr. Mitchell: Think independently of norms. To dance from your heart you must think for yourself. Without independent thinking dance has no vibrancy. Okay, rond de jambe par terre. (Mr. Mitchell demonstrates) Preparation open, rond de jambe front, front, front, front, chasse en avant, temps lie, reverse back, back, back, back, chasse en arriere, temps lie. Battement passe plie (back) battment passe plie (back) releve arabesque, rond de jambe en l’air, tendue en avant. Reverse back, through, back through, back side front close fifth. Cambre forward, up sous-sus back, tendu back, slide lunge down, up, arabesque, ponche, stretch, bring it up, plie arabesque, releve and balance, attitude balance, posse balance, sous-sus, plie. Got it?

Scott: After the rond jambe is the battments?

Mr. Mitchell: Yes.

Scott: Okay.

Mr. Mitchell: (music starts0 Preparation one, open two…(Scott executes combination) eyes, up…turn out…stay on top of the leg…use your back with your port-de-bras…extend…opposing energy…that’s it…perch…control. Better, why the mistake?

Scott: I wasn’t counting.

Mr. Mitchell: Do you need to count?

Scott: How else will I know?

Mr. Mitchell: How else…feel it. Feel the music and movement phrasing. It’s all right there. Your body knows when the phrase is over. Just listen with your whole being, feel your music, and let it occur; don’t force. Over zealous dancing is boring no matter what the intention. Rather than muscle through it and count, open to let the movement move you and let the music tell you when to change.

Scott: I feel like if I let go of counting I won’t know where I am.

Mr. Mitchell: And?

Scott: And that doesn’t feel good.

Mr. Mitchell: Is it required to feel good?

Scott: Well feeling lost is not staying on the beat.

Mr. Mitchell: Maybe until you feel that lost feeling you might never know the beat. The beat, the pulse, is there for you to feel. You can know intuitively where you are and if you let go you can let your body lead you.

Scott: I end up lost though.

Mr. Mitchell: Better to be lost and feeling than on the beat and in your head.

Scott: Didn’t you teach me to count the music Mr. Mitchell?

Mr. Mitchell: Now that you know how, it is time you throw it away. Everything you learn, if you really learn it, becomes second nature. Trust your unconscious knows even as you let it go consciously. You must constantly throw away your knowledge and move on into doing it without thinking. Dance cannot be a thought experiment like it is in university departments where you are graded on politically correct tangible things. Dance is lived in the intangibles; the nuances are limitless. But you can only get there by learning the technique and then throwing it away so you can simply use it to dance.

Scott: But in school they want us to memorize every little fact, nothing can be thrown away as you say.

Mr. Mitchell: Remembering is not learning

Scott: Don’t you have to remember to learn?

Mr. Mitchell: What is important will always be remembered. The heightened emotion that accompanies an important experience will always create an intense memory; no work needed.

Scott: It doesn’t work that way in school.

Mr. Mitchell: Eventually schools will catch up with brain science that shows this truth; even though it is common sense. But schools want you to become good citizens and that is something different.

Scott: Dance is more like living.

Mr. Mitchell: Dance is living; all performing arts are; living in the moment on stage; really living, not pretending. To live is to move; infants who don’t move die. Infants grow in relation to their movements; the brain develops through movement. Do the other side.

(Scott does the other side)

Good, extend…reach…feel the energy…yes…indulge in the beauty of the movement…better, good, pull up, send the energy down…okay, much better.

Scott: I felt freer.

Mr. Mitchell: You were. You had your mind under control and you let it go so you could just feel it and do it…nice.

Scott: Thank you.

Mr. Mitchell: Okay frappes…(starts to think of combination)

Scott: Can I ask a question?

Mr. Mitchell: Sure.

Scott: In men’s class yesterday, Tim brought his foot back to coud de pied every time rather than flexed, which is correct?

Mr. Mitchell: What do you think?

Scott: I’m not sure; we do it flexed so I’m thinking that is correct.

Mr. Mitchell: Tim comes from another school of ballet, sometimes there are varying ways to do the same step.

Scott: What school do you teach?

Mr. Mitchell: Mostly Russian, but I teach from my experience which is eclectic.

Scott: How many schools are there?

Mr. Mitchell: How many do you know?

Scott: Well Russian, I know there is English…

Mr. Mitchell: Royal Academy.

Scott: Bourneville…

Mr. Mitchell: Danish.

Scott: Ah…what else?

Mr. Mitchell: I don’t know; what else?

Scott: I don’t know…oh French, it’s taught in French.

Mr. Mitchell: Okay for the next lesson please give me a report of the different ballet methodologies and their distinctions.

Scott: Since the beginning?

Mr. Mitchell: Yes, where was the beginning?

Scott: You told us this before…Italy, right? (Mr. Mitchell nods yes) and then king Louis the fourteenth developed it right? (nods yes again) Its really another elite art form made by the rich.

Mr. Mitchell: Can’t get much richer than Louis the fourteenth, he was one of the richest men in the world in the seventeenth century.

Scott: Why did he develop ballet?

Mr. Mitchell: Okay, add this to your homework; research Louis’s development of ballet. A clue though was it was part of a bigger agenda for power that led to a cultural explosion.

Scott: Kill armies by day and dance the night away (laughs).

Mr. Mitchell: Not much has changed has it? Okay frappes,; when I hear your homework I will explain the different approaches to frappes; you may discover for yourself in your research. For now, flex your foot as we do in class. Preparation, flex…(begins to demonstrate combination as…) [LIGHTS FADE]

Scene 2

(Scott catches Mr. Pence {Tom} in hallway of school)

Scott: You flunked me you son of a bitch.

Tom: You did it to yourself.

Scott: I wrote the freakin’ paper. I did the work.

Tom: But you didn’t write an accurate paper.

Scott: I wrote the truth as best as I see it.

Tom: Well that truth is sacrilegious and heresy.

Scott: Since when is history an entrance into heaven?

Tom: Do you have no regard for your country?

Scott: My regard is exactly what I wrote.

Tom: Well then you flunked my class.

Scott: Because you are so dogmatic you can’t even entertain another point of view other than the sanctified official version of history which was fed to you.

Tom: Your half-baked claims that America is the most criminal country in the world don’t even need inquiry. They are wrong. Dead wrong. And will only create trouble for you.

Scott: What the hell do you care? All you care about is keeping the status quo. Keeping your rosy-eyed version of history so that you can keep your job, so that you can continue to delude your students, go home to your poisoned manicured lawn, eat animals you would never have the nerve to kill your self and screw you wife every Saturday night.

Tom: Get out of my face. You flunked. Live with it.

Scott: This is not the end of this.

Tom: What you wanna make more trouble for yourself?

Scott: Who gives a shit? Really, do you care? Does anyone care beyond their own self-interest? Fuck it.

[BLACK OUT]

Scene 3

(In father’s {Frank} woodworking studio)

Scott: He flunked me! He fucking flunked me!

Frank: I’m not surprised.

Scott: Do you care?

Frank: About what?

Scott: That he flunked me for nothing but bullshit!

Frank: You call that bullshit? That’s where you go wrong son. You think its okay to do whatever you want and you’ve yet to understand the consequences of…

Scott: Don’t start that shit, I understand…

Frank: If you did you wouldn’t make the choices…

Scott: Maybe I make choices based on other criteria.

Frank: And then you flunk.

Scott: And then I learn! And that’s the hypocrisy of it all. I think differently, I do my research, I investigate for truth, and I get punished for it.

Frank: You aren’t punished, you’re receiving a grade. You’re not home schooled anymore Scott.

Scott: Bullshit. It’s a slap on the wrist. It’s a pressure to put me back in line. It tells me that to pass I need to write what everyone else writes.

Frank: In your own way.

Scott: What’s the point of my own way if its just another version of the same thing?

Frank: What’s wrong with that?

Scott: Everything! You think the shit we live is great. We are the freest, the richest, the most powerful, the most advanced, the most of the most, the best of everything.

Frank: This country has kept the world safe and prosperous.

Scott: How safe and prosperous are the native Americans that are dead? You are blind to the truth…

Frank: Son, would you like to live under communism, under a dictatorship which would…

Scott: We already do! You just can’t see it! You think you are free but you are a prisoner of this system which keeps you a slave to the economy.

Frank: I work freely and by choice and I make enough of a living to maintain a standard of living that has given you all you need so that you could grow up and be smart enough to challenge your teachers.

Scott: Smart enough? I don’t believe that.

Frank: You’re right. I think its dumb. But you’re a smart kid if you would just…

Scott: What? If I would just behave, fit in, be like everyone else? What’s smart about that?

Frank: What’s wrong with that?

Scott: The whole thing, it’s sick. I wanna be myself and I sure as hell can’t be in this house or that school.

Frank: Then why don’t you take your ungrateful ass somewhere else and live in your dreams. And take your “F” with you.

Scott: That’s how much you care?

Frank: Son, I can’t take your negativity much more. You complain and criticize everything. You have no fun in your life these days and it’s driving me crazy! Hell you didn’t even smile at Christmas.

Scott: Fine. Keep your blinders on. You’re right, there’s no point in my being here. (walks out)

Frank: Son just be happy…that’s all I want. [BLACK OUT]

Scene 4

(in voice studio)

Mrs. Saxon: Hello Scott.

Scott: Hi.

Mrs. Saxon: How has your week been?

Scott: Okay.

Mrs. Saxon: Just okay?

Scott: Yeah, not the best week.

Mrs. Saxon: What happened?

Scott: I flunked my history final.

Mrs. Saxon: That’s not like you, what happened?

Scott: I wrote about history in a different way.

Mrs. Saxon: What did you do tell the truth about the genocide that Americans committed to start this country.

Scott: Worse.

Mrs. Saxon: Ooh…so you flunked?

Scott: Yeah, I thought my teacher was more open but he’s just as rigid as everyone else.

Mrs. Saxon: That’s why you study arts, to find open inquiry into life.

Scott: But school is the opposite; education is the boring path to become successful.

Mrs. Saxon: School may be boring; education though is exciting and open.

Scott: Not in school it isn’t; I don’t see the point. My mom unschooled me, she let me live and learn naturally.

Mrs. Saxon: Educate yourself Scott. Get through school, play the game, but educate yourself like you are.

Scott: That’s how I got in trouble.

Mrs. Saxon: You’re not in trouble; you got a grade, a judgment from someone, that’s all.

Scott: Yeah but my dad is not happy with me.

Mrs. Saxon: Your dad wants you to succeed that’s all.

Scott: Yeah but his success is just as boring as school.

Mrs. Saxon: You’re smart, play the game. Give the school and your dad what they want and you’re much more likely to get what you want.

Scott: I know, I used to do that, but lately I can’t bring myself to kiss everyone’s ass anymore.

Mrs. Saxon: Well, let’s sing, singing always makes life better…

Hands on your navel, inhale, exhale, use your belly, faster

Inhale, hold your breath, pull your muscles in, arms up, one, two, three, exhale hinge

Inhale, hold your breath, pull your muscles in, arms side, one, two, three, exhale hinge

Inhale, hold, pull it in, arms overhead, hang from the waist, up, exhale hinge

Collapse your chest, inhale expand, hold your breath, hear roll around, relax your jaw, other way

Base of the ribs, in and out

Hands above the navel, inhale, pull muscles in, kick it out gee, gah, gee, …gee, gay, gee,…gee goh gee

Hands below the navel, inhale, pull muscles in, kick it out gee, gah, gee, …gee, gay, gee,…gee goh gee

Inhale, lunge, gee, gah, gee, …gee, gay, gee,…gee goh gee

Other side, inhale, lunge, gee, gah, gee, …gee, gay, gee,…gee goh gee

Inhale, blow pull it in, exhale and bellow, hinge

Inhale, blow pull in, collapse your rib cage, exhale and bellow

Inhale, blow, gee, gah, gee, …gee, gay, gee,…gee goh gee

Inhale, blow, collapse your ribs, gee, gah, gee, …gee, gay, gee,…gee goh gee

Jaw, up and down, side to side, massage, yawn

Finger on your larynx, swallow, gulp, gulp, gulp, open wide drop the jaw,

Tongue, in and out, side, other side, roll it down in and out, side, side, twist, other way, circle it, reverse

Eyes, cross your fingers, in, out, up left, around down, up right, around down, repeat, follow the eyes, in

Okay, ears…

Scott: Can I ask a question Mrs. Saxon?

Mrs. Saxon: Sure.

Scott: Why do we do this with the eyes?

Mrs. Saxon: Why not?

Scott: Well why in singing class?

Mrs. Saxon: Why not?

Scott: What does it have to do with singing? We don’t do this in choir.

Mrs. Saxon: Do you use your eyes when you sing?

Scott: Yes.

Mrs. Saxon: How so?

Scott: Well, you read music.

Mrs. Saxon: Right, and what about when you aren’t reading music but are performing?

Scott: You look at your audience, or wherever…

Mrs. Saxon: Yes, your eyes are very significant to your performance. If they are focused and relaxed, your singing will be too.

Scott: Why don’t we do it in choir?

Mrs. Saxon: Ask your teacher.

Scott: In choir we just sing, we don’t do all this warm up stuff first, we sing scales.

Mrs. Saxon: Singing is a full body activity. It’s a performing art. The whole body is your instrument. You want your whole body to be strong and flexible, controlled, and relaxed. Your eyes are the main vehicle of expression. Brooding eyes creates brooding singing. Open alive eyes create open alive singing.

Scott: Yeah, that’s what I like about this, it always feels so invigorating.

Mrs. Saxon: What makes it so invigorating?

Scott: I guess the breathing and the movements. After singing with you I can hit high notes, in choir I feel tight.

Mrs. Saxon: When the whole body is freely moving life is easy.

Scott: You sound like my ballet teacher.

Mrs. Saxon: The body is where truth resides. The eyes are where we look to see if someone is telling the truth. The body experiences and holds truth. The mind experiences and then can manipulate and play tricks and alter the truth of your real experience.

Scott: Yeah…no matter how much I say I’m feeling better and I’m moving forward, my body won’t let me.

Mrs. Saxon: Trust your body, it knows. If there is more grief in your body, accept that, don’t fight it.

Scott: But then I can’t move forward and everyone doesn’t like that.

Mrs. Saxon: Live for your truth, not others.

Scott: I don’t know how. Maybe when I’m done with school and can run my own life I’ll know how.

Mrs. Saxon: Right here, right now, practice…run in place…BAH…BAY…BIH, BOH, BOO

[LIGHTS FADE]

Scene 5

(in classroom as Mr. Pence prepares for class)

Tom: Did you come here to argue some more? Because if you did I won’t tolerate it.

Scott: I came here to find out how I can change my grade, no, your grade.

Tom: It’s too late. You’ve shown your work. I graded it. It’s done.

Scott: What if I rewrite the paper?

Tom: Your damage is done.

Scott: I can rewrite it exactly how you want it.

Tom: It’s that easy?

Scott: Yes.

Tom: Then why didn’t you do that in the first place?

Scott: I wrote it according to what I know and believe. This time I’ll write what you want to hear.

Tom: It’s not what I want to hear it’s the facts of history.

Scott: Don’t you realize that your textbooks are part of a system that’s designed to promote the official version that’s slanted and not factual.

Tom: It’s that kind of thinking that will get you nowhere.

Scott: What is the Logan Act?

Tom: What, now am I being tested?

Scott: Who are the Bilderbergs?

Tom: Do you need to compound an already tense relationship?

Scott: I am presenting a piece of history left out of your politically correct textbook.

Tom: For what reason? Why aren’t you focused on your work rather than wasting your energy snooping for irrelevant information?

Scott: Wouldn’t it be historically relevant if our heads of state, our top CEO’s, our central bankers, and many other wealthy elite met with other elite persons from around the world every year to discuss world issues?

Tom: They do that all the time, so what?

Scott: Do you know about the Bilderberg meetings?

Tom: I confess I do not, enlighten me.

Scott: Every year, since 1954, the wealthy elite and powerful people of the world meet in secret and discuss their plans for the world. Barrack Obama and Hilary Clinton were there in 2008.

Tom: Wouldn’t we know about that? They were presidential candidates that year; the press was following them as much as they do now. Where do you come up with this stuff?

Scott: They ditched the press, which was reported, but then the press did not mention that they were in Virginia, exactly where the Bilderberg meeting was taking place.

Tom: They had a secret meeting, I remember that. But it was between them.

Scott: If it was just between them why did it need to be secret?

Tom: Okay, let’s say they went to this meeting, what was discussed?

Scott: Only they know, it’s a secret meeting.

Tom: Who else attended?

Scott: Officials from the IMF, the World Bank, government officials from all governments around the world, - usually about a hundred twenty people.; always David Rockefeller, and always Henry Kissinger.

Tom: Do you think there is something wrong with this?

Scott: Do you think the Logan Act is important?

Tom: If U.S. citizens are unofficially representing the U.S. foreign policy in significant ways, then the Logan Act ought to be used and the actions stopped.

Scott: If the Logan Act is used, people go to jail.

Tom: And so they should. It is dangerous to have U.S. foreign policy divided and conflicted with two different strategies, one official and one unofficial. Influencing a foreign government without being an official representative of the U.S. could lead to all kinds of messy situations. Logan himself was lucky to have had a good outcome with the French. But congress knew it was a bad precedent and wrote the Logan Act.

Scott: Well isn’t that exactly what is going on in the Bilderberg meetings?

Tom: I don’t know.

Scott: Do you want to know?

Tom: Maybe this is not as important as you think. If it were I am sure the press would cover it.

Scott: This is where you lose credibility with me. C’mon, you know as well as I do that the news corporations in this country are owned by a very small handful of individuals and they are all a part of the wealthy elite. We even talked about that in class.

Tom: They may slant their news coverage towards a certain ideology, and maybe omit things damaging to their advertisers, but they cover the news. Journalists would love this kind of scoop, they’d cover it. And this kind of scoop would sell papers which is their main goal. They have to make a profit just like everyone else. You’re unrealistic.

Scott: Well what if they lose money if they print what the elite forbids them to print? What if their very existence is threatened by reporting on these meetings?

Tom: You are sounding crazy and paranoid.

Scott: Prove me wrong; find out if it is true that David Rockefeller said he thanks the press for promising to keep discretion about the Bilderberg meetings for forty years.

Tom: And how is this going to help your grade? Isn’t that why you’re here?

Scott: If I’m right, then you’re going to reread my paper and judge it on a larger view than your narrow textbook; how’s that?

Tom: If you weren’t such an interesting and intriguing person, I’d throw you out. I wouldn’t necessarily say you’re likable, but you could be if you would work on it. But you do have persuasive passion. I’m going to keep an open mind and look into what you are saying. If its garbage, I’m going to report your paranoia to your counselor and it will be the last time I consider your arguments.

Scott: I’ll be out of here soon anyway.

Tom: You have to pass my class to graduate don’t forget.

Scott: Use the internet. True liberty and democracy live there.

Tom: So why is it called Bilderberg?

Scott: After the name of the first hotel in the Netherlands that hosted the first meeting.

Tom: You really think this is important.

Scott: This is just the tip of the iceberg. [BLACK OUT]

Scene 6

(the Walker’s dinner table)

Frank: Why don’t you eat your food?

Scott: I’m not really hungry.

Frank: Son, you let life get to you, you should lighten up.

Scott: Dad, please don’t lecture me.

Frank: If you want to stay miserable and miss the good times, be a fool.

Scott: I’m not miserable.

Frank: Then why are you acting so unhappy all the time?

Scott: I’m working things out in my mind that’s all.

Frank: Well you could do it with a smile on your mug once in awhile.

Scott: Why can’t you just accept that life is shit sometimes?

Frank: Life is what we make it.

Scott: Yeah, with a lot mixed in from “out there”.

Frank: So you deal with the hand you’re dealt.

Scott: Can’t you just allow me my feelings?

Frank: Its time to shift son. You’ve got to move into a happier way of seeing things.

Scott: Happier?

(silence)

Scott: Happier?

Frank: You can’t brood day after day. Christ its starting to infect your school work. How the hell did you flunk your history final?

Scott: (explodes) What the fuck do you want?! I can’t just close my feelings off like you can, you’re a fucking marine! I’m a goddamn human being, and my mom is dead! You can go about your life like you are a big strong guy, nothing can beat you, but I am not you! Sometimes I wonder if you even loved mom!

Frank: Son, I just want our lives to move forward so we can go on living.

Scott: Maybe we can’t! Maybe we’re stuck; stuck in the incomprehensible fact that some drunken asshole took mom out. Stuck in the goddamn pain I feel every time I think about it!

Frank: (explodes) Then stop thinking about it!

Scott: How can I??!!

Frank: Shut it off!

Scott: Like you?! I am not a robot! How the hell do you do it! How can you just accept it and move on?

Frank: (calmly) Son I have seen the worst of human beings. I have picked up friend’s body parts blown off for reasons I could barely understand. I have been to the worst hell and lived through it. I made a decision: I will survive.

Scott: Well sometimes I’d rather be dead.

Frank: (shocked) You are strong son. Your mother is gone. You will meet her again later, when it is time. Until then you will get through this and make your life.

Scott: It just feels like life is one big lie. It’s not what everyone thinks, we are living a bullshit life of pretending.

Frank: No son, its people just trying to get along in life as best they can.

Scott: Get along? People are killing each other more than anything else. They teach us its wrong to kill, “thou shall not kill” but how do we get along? By killing each other! Its bullshit hypocrisy, no one believes it.

Frank: Your mother was killed in an accident…

Scott: I’m not talking about mom right now I’m talking about the idiocy of teaching kids it is wrong to kill and then sending them to war to kill!

Frank: War is not the same.

Scott: Oh so in war we can do whatever? We can become killing animals and break all the rules and laws like it’s a different reality?

Frank: It is a different reality.

Scott: It’s the same planet and people are people. Just because you live “over there” doesn’t mean your life is less important.

Frank: Sometimes son you have to accept the imperfections of life. If you want change make it happen.

Scott: How? There is no changing in life. What’s done and is done and I can’t change that! Mom is dead! Like everyone else! Dead! The real history of this country and the world hasn’t changed ever, its war. The only change is that we get better at it and we cover it up with words that lie. You think these guys are heroes. School puts these guys on a pedestal as if they are fucking super heroes and we worship them like they are gods. But all they are are killers. Just like Hitler, there’s no difference.

Frank: Wars shaped the world that is true. But also great accomplishments took place. Look at the technology we have, the freedoms in this country, the high standard of living…

Scott: Who’s high standard of living? Go ask the kids in the ghettoes! And just because you have THINGS doesn’t mean living is high. The Rockefellers know what a high standard of living is. The rest of us are just serfs to that kind of wealth. We still live in the real world where drunk people kill others. Is that a high standard of living? Is that person really happy?

Frank: Probably not but that is someone who is irresponsible.

Scott: Who isn’t? When you drink and drive like everyone else are you responsible? Just because you haven’t killed anyone, at least on the road, is that responsible? Was it really responsible when you killed all them “gooks” over there?

Frank: I was fighting for my country!

Scott: Your country was using you!

Frank: My country needed me to…

Scott: Your country couldn’t give a damn!

Frank: Son that’s enough!

Scott: No it’s not enough! It’s not enough that we fund both sides of war; that won’t convince you! That we made bin Laden and Hussein and the rest - we made them who they became. We funded them, gave them millions, gave them guns, tanks, and even made money off them while your tax dollars, under “freedom fighters” were spent to create the enemy that we went in to destroy years later and make even more money from that, all financed by your tax dollars! If that isn’t enough what is? Nothing! You just wanna be blind and kiss your country’s imperialistic ass! And I don’t want Father Joe’s religion!

Frank: My goddamn years in Vietnam were hell but I did it for my country. I did not question my mission I did my job! Christ you sound like your mother! She never liked my service and I’ll tell you there is nothing worse than doing your duty and coming home to an ungrateful country, especially your family!

Scott: Well maybe you should have thought about that before you went.

Frank: Before I went I was finishing high school and trying to get into college. I didn’t think about that stuff, I was a kid, and I was enjoying my senior year. Kids don’t need to think about these things.

Scott: Well I do, you and mom let me be a self directed learner without school. You taught me to think about my actions and mom taught me to love all life. And when I think about these things I can’t forgive people for how dumb and hypocritical they are…(starts to cry)

Frank: (takes Scott’s shoulders) Son, you are thinking too much. … (pause)Why don’t you see Father Joe again?

Scott: I don’t want Father Joe’s religion dad, it’s just another escape.

Frank: Scott, you have to let go and just live life a bit. Enjoy the simple things and…

Scott: What the fuck is so simple in watching your mom die?! (runs out)

[BLACK OUT]

Scene 7

(in classroom at computer)

(cell phone rings)

Tom: Hi honey/Yes I’m doing some reading/Yeah I’ll be home shortly/Yes, I have to talk with him tomorrow morning/I just can’t blow it off honey, he’s my student/I’m not taking on any more than I should, he’s a smart kid and he needs help/Yes I know I have a smart kid too honey. Just give me a little more time, I’ll be home soon/It is. He’s right about this Bilderberg group. They meet every year and they are planning our futures/They’re the highest of all classes and they have power individually and as a group even more so. They seem to want to dominate the world/I’m not exaggerating. They have plans to depopulate the planet and make a one world government/Honey it makes sense to me. It’s easy to see how national sovereignty is already eroded with NATO, the European union, The World bank, The United Nations programs that…/Yes they are fighting for peace, but they have international power that often trumps a country’s sovereignty/Yes I know but how is it that they have been meeting for half a century and we didn’t know about it? There’s a piece of me that feels betrayed. You know how much I despise lying and for all my life I have been lied to and kept in the dark about this. How many more lies does the government have behind the scenes?/Yes people meet in secret, but these powerful people meet and discuss our foreign policy and relationship to other countries and their desire to create a new world order. He’s right they are breeching the Logan Act/No this is not a conspiracy; if anything, they are conspiring. Once you start looking, it’s in plain view for anyone who cares to read about it/Because the media are part of the group. The same reason the media cooperates with the military. Like the secrecy of the HARRP program we just watched and never knew about, the media cooperates with the Bilderbergs because they are a part of the group and are sure to find trouble if they cover it to the public. Remember when Obama and Hillary Clinton ditched the press and had that secret meeting that we thought was rather bizarre? They went to the Bilderberg meeting/ No I’m just taking it seriously/ I will keep it light/Okay, see ya soon. (hangs up and stares into space, then returns to his computer screen)

[BLACK OUT]

Scene 8

(the Walker living room – Scott playing music as Gabrielle enters)

Scott: Hey.

Gabrielle: Hey. (kisses and hugs Tom excitedly) Guess what I just read about?

Scott: What?

Gabrielle: I was listening to an interview with Prince and he brings up Dick Gregory and chemtrails – it’s what they’re spraying out of…

Scott: Airplanes to control the weather.

Gabrielle: That’s what they say but that’s not what it is.

Scott: It’s never what they say it is.

Gabrielle: How come you know about this already? I thought I might enlighten you.

Scott: I’ve been reading about this stuff for a while now; remember, I was unschooled.

Gabrielle: You are lucky, I had to attend Catholic school for seven years while you were home schooled, or unschooled, whatever you want to call it. Well I’ll find something to enlighten you about. (teasing and kissing him)

Scott: So what did Prince say about it?

Gabrielle: Nothing really, he drops this bomb and moves on, just says people need to know about these things. But I read about it and its freakin’ crazy – barium, cadmium, aluminum…

Scott: Yeah, wonder why their doing it?

Gabrielle: Its part of a plan isn’t it? Part of the Bilderberg plan to sicken everyone, make them into simple idiots and use them for their purposes.

Scott: Oh C’mon that’s just conspiracy theory! (teasing her back and kissing her) How could they kill everyone, make them all sick but not get sick or die themselves?

Gabrielle: I don’t know. Do you? I wondered that too.

Scott: My guess is that they’re psychopaths so fucking bent on getting power…

Gabrielle: And money…

Scott: No it isn’t money they’re after, not for the real elite. They have all the money they need or want. What they really want is power.

Gabrielle: To control everyone.

Scott: Everyone and everything including nature. Shit they have plans to live in outer space.

Gabrielle: That’s ridiculous we can’t do that, how could they survive?

Scott: Isn’t there already an international space station-people staying up there for long periods of time already. Shit there’s underground cities all over the world.

Gabrielle: Yeah but to live there?

Scott: The technology is already there, the plans are ready. They just need to implement it. Problem is governments have stopped spending money on space programs. Its out of vogue now.

Gabrielle: What about the Star Wars program, is that still funded?

Scott: Now, that’s what HAARP is, similar program, different name.

Gabrielle: Isn’t that connected to the chemtrails too? I read that.

Scott: It’s hard to know exactly what is what; it’s all so secret, like all the government/military programs throughout the years.

Gabrielle: Eventually the truth comes out though, like the secret government radiation program or the syphilis experiments of the Tuskegee guys. Now with the web there’s easier ways to get the information. HAARP even has a web site, I saw it.

Scott: Yeah but you only get what they want to show you.

Gabrielle: Well I know its Army/Navy and they are using Tesla’s ideas about shooting low frequency energy into the stratosphere…

Scott: Ionosphere…

Gabrielle: Right, higher, smarty pants, into the Ionosphere and then sending it back down to earth to create weather patterns. Seems it’s a front for military action.

Scott: Sure, all armies would love to control the weather right? Shit, then you might not even need to go to war. Create the earthquake, the hurricane, the tsunami, do the damage, and then go in and make money cleaning up and reorganizing how you want and take control where you want.

Gabrielle: God this stuff is so scary; part of me doesn’t even want to know about it.

Scott: No! That’s fuckin’ crazy. If we just turn away they will control the world! They’re close but they’re not there yet. We have to stop them.

Gabrielle: You’re sounding a bit paranoid again now. What if you have to go to jail?

Scott: Why would I have to go to jail?

Gabrielle: For talking about this stuff. Maybe they would call you a terrorist or a conspiracy nut…

Scott: What the fuck, just because I think differently doesn’t mean I’m a fuckin’ terrorist! I’m not trying to hurt anyone, I’m not a criminal.

Gabrielle: Yeah but you’re unpatriotic. You’re accusing your government of treason.

Scott: You sound like them now, like everyone else! Then go watch your movie and eat your popcorn and be like everyone else, dumb and dumber because you’re either afraid or convinced that the experts know better than we do.

Gabrielle: God, sometimes you are so cold.

Scott: No the fucking government is cold. The police are cold. The fuckin’ military are cold, cold blooded killers sent by the government to do the dirty work of the gangster bankers!

Gabrielle: What, if I don’t agree with you I can’t be with you?

Scott: What’s the point?

Gabrielle: Love?

Scott: Love is just an excuse to get hurt. Everyone you love dies anyway.

Gabrielle: But I’m here, not dead and I love you.

Scott: Then don’t live in that bullshit fear, that’s what they want and there’s no fear in love.

Gabrielle: What do you mean?

Scott: How can you love and fear at the same time?

Gabrielle: It’s called mixed feelings.

Scott: No when you’re afraid you’re not feeling love. Think about it it’s common sense.

Gabrielle: Okay but maybe I flip from one to the other.

Scott: Fine but life is too short to waste. While you’re sitting in fear I could be dying.

Gabrielle: No…(goes and hugs him) I love you..

Scott: (slowly) …I’m sorry I’m so worked up.

Gabrielle: It gets to me too. I’m just not as strong as you are.

Scott: I don’t feel very strong. Sometimes I feel crazy.

Gabrielle: Don’t we all sometimes? You’re not crazy, you’re grieving.

Scott: Everyone thinks that should be over now.

Gabrielle: Don’t listen to them, its okay.

Scott: I just feel so angry all the time now.

Gabrielle: Well maybe you should just accept that. I’d be angry too if my mom was killed like that.

Scott: But I get so angry at the world. I can’t just say things calmly anymore.

Gabrielle: What about Father Joe?

Scott: He’s a good guy but I don’t really believe in his God anymore.

Gabrielle: Make God what works for you Scott. It’s the only way I got through St. Johns.

Scott: But do we really need God or is it just to feel better and make sure there’s’ hope so we can endure dying?

Gabrielle: I don’t know, I ask myself too. At church everyone seems so happy and certain, but I wonder…because so much is guilt and hypocritical. I love the idea of Jesus but I don’t see many Christians living it.

Scott: Jesus would cast all the war believers to hell. He said turn the other cheek, he said to forgive others, he said we are all brothers…

Gabrielle: He would also say we are sinners cause we are having sex without marriage (teasing him)

Scott: I don’t think he would care as long as we love each other.

Gabrielle: Yeah, the church is always changing its rules, how is that Gods’ word?

Scott: Gabrielle you really help me, thank you.

Gabrielle: You know Scott, everyone is trying to help. They just do it in their own way.

Scott: Well you make me feel sane; I can be real with you.

Gabrielle: Yeah, it’s so hard to be real. School is the same as church, it’s like to be real you have to hide away first.

Scott: Let’s hide away at Göbekli Tepe.

Gabrielle: Yeah since nobody wants to believe it because they’d have to rewrite history. We could hide in ancient glorious city in Turkey, and no one would care.

Scott: I could have you all to myself (teasing, flirting) we could escape (more teasing) we could be free (they kiss and embrace)

[BLACK OUT]

Scene 9

(in classroom at desk, knock at door, Scott enters)

Tom: Hello Scott.

Scott: Hello Mr. Pence.

Tom: You seem tense today.

Scott: Life is tense.

Tom: Why is that?

Scott: Did you read about the Bilderberg group?

Tom: Yes I did.

Scott: Doesn’t that make you tense?

Tom: Why should it?

Scott: Do you like living in the dark?

Tom: No honestly I don’t. But I know the world has its secrets and I’m not going to change that, as much as I would like to. Is that why you’re tense?

Scott: Maybe you’re okay with secret groups running the world but I’m not. You can go on with your life, do your daily duties and talk about nothing but last night’s game or this weekend’s movie and ignore the truth and you can keep teaching the view of history that is naïve and blind to the real history that has shaped our world. I’m out. (walks away)

Tom: Hold on. You were right about this Bilderberg group. And I am going to re-evaluate your paper but I need a bit of time to do so. What seemed so crazy and far-fetched originally seems to have some merit. But let me ask you, why do you believe these people are evil? They are highly skilled and educated men and women who are very successful in this world and have given the world a lot.

Scott: So did Hitler.

Tom: These are not Hilters.

Scott: How did Hitler become Hitler?

Tom: He rose to power and ruled a dictatorship of tyranny.

Scott: He believed in eugenics and became powerful enough to win the support of the Bilderbergs to carry out his plan, which was their plan, which became all of their plan.

Tom: The Bilderberg group wasn’t even formed yet, it started…

Scott: In 1954 I know, but the same families were running the puppets in government, and the Council for Foreign Relations was already formed and the Chatham House. Hell the Rothchilds themselves have had power for hundreds of years. Rockefeller, Morgan, Warburg-they all would have been happy to see a superior Aryan race with everyone else slaves.

Tom: Hitler was an exception; these people live in another world today.

Scott: An exception? Was his lust for world domination any different from the British Empire’s, or the empires of France, or Rome, or Egypt? Hitler and his third Reich were simply continuing what has been going on since civilization began. Look at Cleopatra, who was fighting Caesar AND Marc Antony for world control and ended up taking her own life in defeat.

Tom: It is true isn’t it; there have always been those rulers who want to take control of the world.

Scott: Stalin and Moa are just current names for the mad men who kill people ruthlessly to have more power and take over more territory.

Tom: You do know your history don’t you? You make it a challenge to argue with you, but also a pleasure. But just as no one has ever succeeded in world control before, even if the Bilderbergs try they will fail too.

Scott: Do you really believe that? How? They will control it all in a very different way because they will have the one world organizations that have ultimate power because every country is giving over their sovereignty to these global organizations. Isn’t that what has been happening? Iraq fell because of an International force, not because of war with another single country. Now we’re in Libya doing the same thing.

Tom: You’re right but even with an international army there are large portions of the world not a part of it.

Scott: Not really, the Islamic countries really, that’s it. The façade of Russia and China is antagonistic but behind closed doors they are making deals and planning the future cooperation. Once these countries become central banked, which is happening at an alarming rate and is not even talked about, they’re intimately intertwined with the power base and really can’t fight.

Tom: What do you mean central banked?

Scott: You know as well as I, at least I hope you do, that every country that gets “rescued” and “saved” by the “international coalition” is forced to join the global central banking system. That’s where the real power lies, in controlling our most feared fate, the fall of our economy.

Tom: We do go in and make loads of money remaking the country don’t we? We send in Bechtel and Halliburton to rebuild and the money comes right back to those who did the destruction.

Scott: Who is Halliburton? I’ve heard of them.

Tom: That’s Dick Cheney’s corporation, he was head of it.

Scott: Oh right, then of course we confiscate all the country’s resources and gold supply.

Tom: Just as in merchant times. The Dutch were notorious at this. But isn’t it better that an unstable country like Iraq, run by a tyrannical dictator, become part of the global system which will prohibit it from acting unilaterally?

Scott: Isn’t it a country’s sovereign right to act unilaterally if it wants to?

Tom: Not if it’s a menace to society.

Scott: Like the United States?

Tom: The United States isn’t perfect but we are policing the world, a tall order; there are bound to be mistakes.

Scott: Who gave the US power to police the world?

Tom: After the Second World War there were two super powers, the Soviets fell, and we are still standing.

Scott: Sure the US backs both sides of the war, hidden of course to the public, FDR lets Pearle Harbor happen, just like we let the Gulf Of Tonkin happen and 9/11, all to give us reason to invade other countries with the support of the people. We use all the pressure of embargoes, economic hit men, CIA covert missions, and inside banking and market strategies to strangle a country and then we go in and take over with the military if we need to. The old money of Europe has built a world that swallows everyone else slowly and completely. The US got the police role by plans that started long ago.

Tom: Where do you get these ideas?

Scott: I read.

Tom: What do you read?

Scott: History books that tell a different story than your official propaganda. Iconoclastic books like The Renegade History of the United States, Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, or Tragedy and Hope – that’s been around for a while, have you read it?

Tom: Quigley’s book?

Scott: Yes.

Tom: How did you hear about that book?

Scott: I was home schooled when I was younger, actually it’s called unschooled.

Tom: You mean you had no set curriculum?

Scott: Yeah, my parents let me decide what I wanted to learn about and how I wanted to learn it.

Tom: Yeah, I’ve heard of this but I’ve never met anyone who has done it.

Scott: Well when I decided to try school I read about school and education to see how it started. And one of the books I read is by John Taylor Gatto.

Tom: Teacher of the year in New York, who thinks kids need to be home scooled.

Scott: Right. Anyway he talked about Quigley’s history. Have you read it?

Tom: No I actually haven’t.

Scott: Why not? Aren’t you interested in more than your text books?

Tom: It’s just one book. His interpretation isn’t the end all.

Scott: So you agree history is how you interpret it. But how do you know whether it is the end all, you haven’t read it?

Tom: What makes you think it is?

Scott: I didn’t say that it was, but it is a unique book with otherwise unavailable information.

Tom: How did he get this information, isn’t it just his own different interpretation of the same facts?

Scott: He had access to the archives of the Council for Foreign Relations for two years, no one else has, that’s part of why they took the book out of print immediately after it was published. He told the truth.

Tom: Well maybe I’ll read it. He is a respected historian of great reputation.

Scott: Then maybe you’ll understand me more.

Tom: What is it you want me to understand?

Scott: My thesis that we are doomed by the Bilderbergers or whatever you want to call the elites is based on history not just personality.

Tom: You mean you’re not just negative?

Scott: Maybe you’re just too conformist.

Tom: You don’t want to lighten up do you?

Scott: I want to be real.
Tom: How about real light.

Scott: Why? What is light about our world that is real? Everything that we’ve created is based on mindless entertainment, artificiality and unnaturalness.

Tom: Now you sound like me; my students would prefer to be entertained than to actually read.

Scott: They’re brainwashed.

Tom: They watch too much TV.

Scott: The main brainwashing tool.

Tom: How did you become so different?

Scott: A military father and an artist mother.

Tom: You lost your mother last year just before you moved here I heard…I’m sorry for your loss.

Scott: My mom (tearing up) was a painter. She painted in yellows and blues and beautiful shades of white. She expressed herself with grace and intelligence.

Tom: I see her son following her footsteps.

Scott: Her husband doesn’t think so.

Tom: We all find our ways to cope in this world. Life ain’t easy.

Scott: But how will I follow my mother…(breaks down) I’m not a marine…(Tom hugs him)

[LIGHTS FADE]

Scene 10

(in the Pence kitchen)

Whitney: It just isn’t reasonable. You are unavailable to your daughter while you are so consumed with your debate with a student. This is an important time, you know it, Debby is adjusting to first grade and it isn’t going easy for her; she needs you here.

Tom: I am here.

Whitney: No not here physically, here emotionally. She needs your attention. If she gets enough of our attention whenever we can, we will see her through. If not they may win and prove she’s ADD.

Tom: She is not ADD!

Whitney: I know that but she is acting out in school! She doesn’t want to be there, she doesn’t like it. The kids are not nice to her and she’d rather be home with us.

Tom: Doesn’t she need to experience this transition? Isn’t it okay that she’s going through a rough time? Why do they have to complicate things and label her and maybe medicate her?

Whitney: Because they are idiots! The school has become a pharmacy outlet. Next thing you know we’ll be able to fill all our prescriptions at the school. They are out of control. They have been hijacked by the bio-psychiatric industry and just like parents, they are abdicating responsibility for the children’s behavior and well being, and sloughing it off to an inborn brain chemical imbalance. If that isn’t the biggest crock of bullshit I don’t know what is. Our daughter needs our attention that’s all. And when we shower her with our attention again her attention will be calm and consistent.

Tom: Maybe we should take her out of school.

Whitney: How?

Tom: Home-school her.

Whitney: Who?

Tom: Whoever wants to quit working.

Whitney: Sure both of us would but how do the bills get paid?

Tom: If we lose one salary we would need to scale down and cut our expenses: we’ve done it before.

Whitney: And we went into debt which is why we are both working now since she is in school. Tom, we have too much debt to pay, we can’t afford this.

Tom: Then what do you think?

Whitney: I think we have to give Debby all the time we can when we are not working. Instead of coming home and wanting some R & R and time to ourselves, we need to be much more involved with Debby.

Tom: Involved how?

Whitney: Emotionally engaged and enjoying life with her by doing things together and just being together talking and playing.

Tom: You think that’s all she needs?

Whitney: The four years I was home with her were great years. (gets choked up) Debby and I were like Mutt and Jeff, we had so much fun together playing and eating and shopping and watching birds and going to the park…

Tom: I think you need that too.

Whitney: Why do we give our kids to strangers to raise them after we have bonded and are so attached?

Tom: Don’t we give them to be educated, not raised?

Whitney: As much as I love the idea of education, maybe schools aren’t the best way. They almost do more damage than good.

Tom: Well of all ironies, one of the things that’s taking my time, which I see needs to go to Debby, is the history of schools and how they were designed to create the next generation of workers for the factory. It’s a dehumanizing endeavor and planned deliberately by the Rockefeller Foundation to teach children to conform and punch the clock. It isn’t at all about optimizing education. And now the factory model is out of date. And the teaching to the test is more dehumanizing conformity; there is no room for individuals to think and learn their own way and their own knowledge. It is really force fed.

Whitney: Debby was fine until she went to school. She has learned how to defend herself with cruelty and to play personality games to be liked and she is not her loving self she used to be.

Tom: So what’s our solution?

(pause)

Whitney: Shit. Maybe the only solution is to keep her home schooled.

Tom: We’ll have to sacrifice. (staring into space)

Whitney: We’ll have to eat like birds, maybe rent out our nest, sell a car, and then try to pay back our debt.

Tom: Where there’s a will there’s a way.

Whitney: Who?

Tom: Who?

Whitney: You.

Tom: Me?

Whitney: She needs you right now.

Tom: Why?

Whitney: She needs her father to love her actively (is affectionate and playful with him). She knows I love her and would do anything for her. She needs your gentle masculine heart to engulf her in loving education. You’re an educator at heart and you need her to help sharpen your skills.

Tom: You are amazing.

Whitney: You are exactly what she needs.

Tom: You know, this is exactly what Scott needs too only there’s no way he’s going to get it.

Whitney: Why not?

Tom: His mom died last year. She was killed by a drunk driver. And his dad is a marine; doesn’t sound like he’s available.

Whitney: Well don’t think of taking him on too. You can’t save the entire world.

Tom: I’m concerned for him.

Whitney: Did you finish Tragedy and Hope?

Tom: A few pages left but it’s sent me in all kinds of other directions to research that I haven’t finished yet. He’s right, it’s a history we don’t teach and it paints a very different picture of our history…and it’s more truthful.

Whitney: Another reason to educate at home.

Tom: That’s what this is about really. Scott is educated but he won’t be schooled.

Whitney: Where does he get his education from?

Tom: He’s a fiercely independent minded kid. Seems he’s got the discipline and confidence of a marine combined with the open mind and compassionate heart of an artist.

Whitney: But where does he get his knowledge from?

Tom: He’s right again about the internet. It’s an incredible model of democratic flow of information. I’ve found websites and information I never would‘ve dreamed were there. And from there it’s easy to get to the library and read books to go deeper. The whole world is on the internet.

Whitney: Well isn’t that why it’s called the World Wide Web? (teasing) But I hear Google and others are trying to tier the net and make it hierarchical: essentially making it available to only those who can pay for it.

Tom: It’s scary. I’m feeling very uneasy about what I’m learning. The world isn’t what we think it is. It really is dominated by these elite money people, the international banking cabal or what Quigley calls the “Anglo American Establishment” of Western civilization. They rule from behind the scenes.

Whitney: Why behind the scenes?

Tom: That’s how they can get things done. Hell every government knows that if it works covertly it can do what it wants much faster and more efficiently.

Whitney: So the people in the news are what, the spokespeople?

Tom: Exactly.

Whitney: Puppets.

Tom: Every presidential candidate regardless of what party they come from is hand picked by the Bilderbergers which basically represent the Anglo American Establishment broadened out to include European and Asian money elite. They can never stray too far from their expectations. So we get Obama’s promises in the campaign and then see the opposite in office. Just like conservative George W who ran up more spending and debt than any president. They do what they gotta do, they don’t care if it follows their party.

Whitney: That’s why I vote third party. I’ve been trying to tell you that for years but you support the system.

Tom: You’re right.

Whitney: But you couldn’t learn that from me you had to learn it through Scott. Maybe next time you’ll listen to me more. (teasing and kissing)

Tom: Right again. On both accounts: Debby and I are lucky people. Being married to you is a wondrous adventure. (hugs her tight)

Whitney: Well let’s hope we can pay for this adventure. (they kiss)

[LIGHTS FADE]

Scene 11

(Frank watching TV in living room)

(Scott enters)

Frank: Hello son.

Scott: Hello.

Frank: Did you see the game last night? What a fourth quarter!

Scott: Naw I missed it.

Frank: Son you’ve been missing a lot of games this year.

Scott: Yeah, I just don’t feel the same, I kinda don’t see the point.

Frank: How about some fun? Good competition, sportsmanship…

Scott: Yeah it’s just not the same.

Frank: Well I’ll be damned to let those tickets go to waste. Why don’t you give me your tickets and I’ll give them to some clients. If you want to go just let me know in advance.

Scott: Dad, I wanna quit school.

Frank: (pauses, looks at him) You’re serious.

Scott: Yes… (pause) I think it’s best.

Frank: And how is that son?

Scott: Dad I’m wasting my time there.

Frank: What are you going to do instead?

Scott: I’ll get a job.

Frank: Where at McDonalds?

Scott: Playing and teaching music.

Frank: Where will that lead you?

Scott: Doesn’t need to lead me anywhere.

Frank: Son if you don’t keep direction in your life you are doomed to fail.

Scott: I’m tired of direction.

Frank: Tired of direction? You’re seventeen years old, about half a year away from a diploma, on your way to college. On your way to freedom and an independent life and you want to throw it away because you’re tired of direction?

Scott: Dad stop! You know , if you could take me more seriously, talk to me like a client maybe, maybe you’d hear me for what I really think and maybe you’d give me some cred for my thinking. I’m not a dumb kid so stop treating me like one.

Frank: Then don’t act like one!

Scott: I’m not, I’m fucking smarter than most of my teachers. They’re idiots who have pretentions that they teach, but all they really do is treat everyone like children. All they know, is how to deal with sarcasm and condescension cause they can’t think beyond their need to be a good teacher, which means giving students A’s so they can look good and keep their stale ass jobs – problem is, they know deep down that they’re not teaching.

Frank: So you think they only do it for money? Isn’t that exactly what you’re going to do?

Scott: When I told my counselor I was going to quit school…

Frank: So you’ve already told him…

Scott: All he could focus on is that the school will lose money with one less head. He didn’t even care what I think. They don’t care about me or anyone else. They just want the image of the school to be good so they can keep their jobs. And no, if I wanted to make money I can think of a lot of other ways to do that better. I play music for other reasons.

Frank: Well what reasons are so important to throw your life away?

Scott: The same fuckin’ reasons that mom painted but you wouldn’t have a clue.

Frank: Is that what this is, your way of honoring your mother?

Scott: I’d rather make music than kill people for some asinine reason called patriotism!

Frank: If it wasn’t for my patriotism and everyone else’s who’s ever fought for this country you wouldn’t have the goddamn freedom to even consider loafing around playing music.

Scott: You can’t brainwash me with that shit, that’s exactly what the school does! Teaches us how to believe in the sanctity of war because we are better than everyone else! They make the next generation of egotistical killers ready to destroy the enemy. But not me, I don’t buy that shit and never have! “I pledge allegiance to the” What? A flag? That represents the hypocritical declaration of independence which starts: all men are created equal. It’s a fucking lie!

Frank: Goddamn it son, life has always been this way! Men are evolving and its getting better all the time; we’re not in the dark ages anymore. Change takes time!

Scott: We don’t have the goddamn time! Can’t you see the world is coming apart? Hell you and everyone else are like Nero singing and fiddling while Rome burned.

Frank: Change takes time. Maybe the burning is part of the purging that is in fact the change.

Scott: Well I’m changing my life now. I’m not going to follow everyone else and live the dream of a good college education, a good job, and a good life of kissing everyone’s ass who is above me, treating those below me like shit, and working all day doing something I don’t care about so I can go shop and spend my money on shit I don’t need while half the fucking world has nothing! All for the holy god of the empire: the economy- Which is the bondage we are all in to the only people with true freedom- the bankers who bankroll our government and the rest of the world with their worthless play money they create out of thin air! Independence hell, what kind of independence does our government have when it is in constant debt to the bankers? And who pays that debt? You do, but you think you’re free.

Frank: I am free! I don’t have debt and I hope I have taught you that.

Scott: Then why can’t you see how fucked your government is?

Frank: I can. Our debt is a real problem and the politicians are playing games, but sooner or later we will have to face it and we will and we will get out of debt.

Scott: It’s impossible, it can’t be done.

Frank: Great men have accomplished great things in this country. It can be done.

Scott: No it can’t! You have no clue. You have no idea of how our monetary system even works. You’re just as ignorant as everyone else.

Frank: Son you better back them words with facts or I will teach you a lesson about name calling that you will never forget.

Scott: Don’t threaten me with your shit, if you kill me I’d be happy! How does the government get its money?

Frank: You tell me.

Scott: First of all taxes which is the stealing of citizen’s property. Second from the Federal Reserve when it needs to do things like bail out its friends. Where does the Federal Reserve get its money from? It makes it up – a group of private citizens- many not even American, get to print money when they want to and dish it out to the US government, but with a catch we all know – interest.

Frank: Well why would we expect to borrow money without interest, nothing is for free.

Scott: Exactly but where does the money come from to pay the interest? They do not print that. It doesn’t exist. So in order to get more money to pay for the interest it has to take out another loan – with interest, and so on and so on like a great big Ponzi scheme we are forever in debt. If you had to do this personally you would be outraged, but you think you are free. Well I want out of this game. My freedom is my music. But you wouldn’t understand that cause you think it’s a luxury not a calling.

Frank: A calling? You’re talking in idealism again. You’re so idealistic you can’t see practicality. Maybe you think you’ll be free by quitting school and playing music but you’ll wake one day to find you lost your way. Problem is it will be too late, opportunity will be gone. You’ll have to live in your idealistic idea of freedom because you missed the chance to be practical. You live in this life, like it or not. Maybe our government is corrupt sometimes- they lie to us you’re right. I’m still outraged at the unnecessary lies about Pat Tillman’s death – all for propaganda, that was indecent. But sometimes people need to be lied to. You can’t trust certain information with the masses of the people.

Scott: Now you sound like the elite! This is exactly what Quigley says – the power establishment knew it had to conceal and mislead both people and the government because they were too weak to handle the truth.

Frank: Most people need to be told what to do, hell look at all the idiots on welfare, they’d rather live off of everyone else then get off their asses and work. Look at the teenage pregnancies that bring all these kids into the world that don’t have a chance and will grow up and become criminals and fill up our prisons which are already overpopulated. People need to be controlled otherwise we’d have rapists and criminals joining the terrorists destroying the world. That’s why we sacrifice a bit of freedom here or there – that’s what prevents the world from being destroyed.

Scott: No it isn’t, it hasn’t done anything but escalate the problems because no one is looking at the root causes of why these problems exist!

Frank: You think you know it all, there’s no talking to you. I’ll tell you one thing son. I will not help you. I cannot stop you from quitting school, I know the laws but if you want to push it I will not help you. You will not live here, drive my car or eat my food. And I will not bail you out when you realize what a mistake you made.

Scott: Father…I will find my real freedom.

Frank: There’s no freedom in poverty son, you must have money to have any freedom.

Scott: You always taught me to have inner character but I see now how conditional it is. Character without money is what?

Frank: If you can’t make a living and you live off others or off the government there is no character in that.

Scott: Does that mean that every bank or institution that survived only because they got free money from the central bank has no character?

Frank: Son, business and banking have their own ways, like it or not. If we hadn’t bailed out those banks the result would have been catastrophic for everyone.

Scott: What, the result now isn’t? Can’t you see how catastrophic our situation is? Did you see the fed audit of the financial crisis?

Frank: The fed saved the world from a horrible depression!

Scott: The fed gave out sixteen trillion dollars during the crisis to its chosen elite, and three trillion went to foreign banks and companies!

Frank: It was necessary! Imagine if we let those companies fall; millions of people would have lost their jobs!

Scott: And then the ones left standing would be the companies that had real value and solvency; maybe then we’d be closer to the truth about what is real!

Frank: You and your Goddamn real philosophy! What is real Scott!

Scott: These guys are criminals and no one cares!

Frank: Who are you, almighty God, giver of judgment?

Scott: Why can’t you see how rigged the world is for these guys?

Frank: Who Scott? Which guys? Where exactly is this conspiracy? You are so paranoid and seeing things…

Scott: The upper elite of money, it’s not hard to…

Frank: Who exactly Scott?!

Scott: The top one percent of the rich!

Frank: Who Scott?!

Scott: Like Warren Buffet who bailed out Goldman Sachs to save his own investment and then got preferred stock which has netted him billions more!

Frank: You are so far out there in left field son, shit, this is the way of the world, get out of your negativity! You are better than this Scott!

Scott: I’m doing my best dad, I’m sorry you can’t see that!

Frank: Quitting school is not doing your best! Playing music is nice but not a career!

Scott: Mom wouldn’t say that!

Frank: Well mom wouldn’t know what a career is!

Scott: What the fuck does that mean?

Frank: I bankrolled her painting! Artist’s leech of other people’s money, your mother didn’t have a dime to herself!

Scott: She had a heart and that’s more than you have!

Frank: Then follow her all the way to the grave.

Scott: Keep your fucking things and stuff ‘em up your ass!

Frank: (slaps Scott hard across the face)

Scott: (is shaken and regains his balance)

Frank: (is shaking)

Scott: (walks away deliberately)

Frank: (is frozen)

[BLACK OUT]

Scene 12

(in park, at tree where mom and Scott used to hang out)

Scott: (calmly and carefully) Mom I can’t take much more of this. I’m lost in my life trying to find truth, its impossible because the groupthink is too much. I know you’d want me to live and find the beauty in spite of it all, find the nectar of good, but mom…(breaks down) I want out of here, please come take me, I’d rather be with you now. I don’t believe in this world any more. I can’t take it seriously; I just don’t get what everyone else gets. They all seem so content and almost happy even as they walk through their lives blind. Why do I see it all so differently? Since you died and we moved from Detroit everything changed. I can’t stand Ann Arbor. I hate school. Why can’t I enjoy the games anymore? I want to live my own life and I’m so sick of watching other people’s lives but that’s all they do. They watch their favorite TV personalities and celebrities, or their favorite teams and athletes and all this reality TV junk that is so fucking empty and useless –everyone is becoming idiots unable to talk about real things. It makes me want to hide and get away from it all. It’s all so artificial, like life everywhere, we have taken anything natural and turned it into something they think is better, but were destroying the world at the same time. I don’t want to quit school, I want to quit life. I don’t fit in; I don’t give a shit about the latest fashion or video game or movie or anything else that excites people. Hell I can’t even talk with dad anymore, he’s just in denial and is holding up strong and he doesn’t want to hear how hard (breaks down) it is to deal with life without you. I can’t talk with anyone really. My teachers and counselors try to talk with me but they only want to tell me how to move on and let go, they don’t really hear me, and I can’t stand the bullshit they are teaching which means nothing to me. Gabrielle and I get along fine, she loves me I think, and I think I love her, but really, it doesn’t mean much to me. I don’t want this life, I don’t like it. I’d rather be there with you mom, I can’t find my inner strength like I tried to …

(Gabrielle walks in, pauses)

Gabrielle: Hi.

Scott: I came here to be in private.

Gabrielle: Do you mind if I’m here?

Scott: Why did you come?

Gabrielle: I needed to talk to you; your dad didn’t know where you were.

Scott: What do you need to talk about?

Gabrielle: Oh now it feels just stupid. You’re here talking with your mom and I’m worried about unimportant things.

(pause)

Scott: I was ready to go anyway; sometimes talking to my mom is a stupid thing.

Gabrielle: She loves you Scott…she loves that you come.

Scott: I can’t give her anything but her energy is always so clear and full – I know that’s all we are, why can’t people see that? They are blind to energy.

Gabrielle: People don’t want to see it Scott.

Scott: Gabrielle why do you get it? Why are you so curious and seeking the truth? You could be really successful if you would just be popular and have fun with everyone.

Gabrielle: I used to lay down in the grass. When I saw the world from that angle I could feel the secret of my heart that felt so much a part of what I saw; the littlest bugs on the single blade of grass…the patterns in the tree that seemed to repeat forever… the open sky that went forever into a mystery…and when clouds were above me I felt their suspension like a thought in my head. There, on the ground, I felt whole. I felt complete. I didn’t need anything else. Joy would fill my heart, peace honestly resided in me and I felt, well even if I weren’t in this world anymore it would be okay…but then when I would get up to go I could feel worry rising in my stomach and throat. I didn’t know how to articulate it then, I just felt it, but now I see that my body would lose its comfortableness and fear would tighten me up.

Scott: Fear kills us all.

Gabrielle: How can we live without it though? I’m finding secrets.

Scott: Do you think life is a secret and we have to figure it out?

Gabrielle: I think we are so covered up, from the beginning, with stuff others give us like the blue boy and the pink girl, that we can’t see the truth. What is it to just be a person? What if we didn’t live this way and we were really like babies who just look around, explore and discover what is without the need to label it all?

Scott: The worst is that the labels get handed down as if their presents. Like it’s gonna be okay now because we know what you are cause we gave you a label.

Gabrielle: People are afraid to see things for what they are. It’s scary to accept that life is all we know, that after life, what we call death is totally unknowable to us. The only real truth is that we don’t know. It’s a mystery, that’s all it is. We have all these ideas and we kill each other over them, and we don’t even know if they are true. We believe, but we don’t really think. We are handed beliefs to believe in but we don’t even take the time to think them through. We believe boys are blue and girls are pink, heaven is up there, the devil down there, doctor’s know best and everyone should get a good education, the enemy is out there, only men and women belong in marriage, the economy has to grow to be good, you must get a good job, drugs are bad, Prozac is good…

Scott: I could use some Prozac right now, maybe that would help.

Gabrielle: You, on Prozac, would be murder.

Scott: That’s okay.

Gabrielle: There are ways that things work. When we look deep enough into just really what’s there, nothing else, just what’s there, we might find how to live in the way life exists.

Scott: The natural laws of the universe…

Gabrielle: Where is greed in nature? Does it exist?

Scott: I dunno where?

Gabrielle: It doesn’t it seems to me. It all works together and there is room and enough for everything until it is time to go extinct.

Scott: When is it time to go extinct?

Gabrielle: When you are no longer useful, after aging has made you less able and whittled you down to just a breath; when the whole has no need for you, when you serve no purpose anymore. Or when something so big devours and destroys you, all of you, your whole species…(silence) kinda like my dad, he got fired today. He’s no longer needed. He is extinct to General Motors. The big storm came and destroyed it all.

Scott: The big storm was planned.

Gabrielle: I know, I see that secret now too. They set everyone up with easy money, easy houses, easy purchase, easy credit, easy luxuries that made everyone feel so good and so happy with all their stuff, and then they took it all away.

Scott: But they got to keep theirs and even get more of ours. They stole our property and kept theirs. Sorry bout your dad.

Gabrielle: He’s so mad; he’s finally seeing a different view. He knows exactly how it happened. They bailed out the big boys while the little guys are dead meat.

Scott: And so it goes…

Gabrielle: But no one is doing anything about it, no one is saying anything. I mean the Tea Party is but they are just fighting for one half of the system. They are just another party that divides us all. Why can’t we come together-we’d be so much stronger that way? Divided between Democrat and Republican we are fighting each other rather than the guys that really run the system.

Scott: People are afraid to see things like they are, just like you said. They can’t see that the two party system is a game used to distract us and keep us away from the bigger picture.

Gabrielle: I read about the Fed this week; it’s nothing but a front for the bankers. It’s amazing what they don’t teach us. We get the simple supply and demand econ 101 while the truth is that they are running a system that is rigged, hedged, leveraged and corrupt, and full of insider dealings. The small guy can never win in this system; all the advantages go to the ones with capital. We’re taught to live within our means but the system wants us to live big and borrow and stay in debt so they can continue to own us and take our property.

Scott: You sound like me now.

Gabrielle: No I did my own investigation. I may agree with you but I am speaking my own truth.

Scott: You are beautiful.

Gabrielle: You make me blush…you are too Scott.

Scott: Let’s go live on a mountain somewhere and get away from it all.

Gabrielle: There is no getting away from it all. (pause) We are interconnected; the rain falls everywhere the same, the air is planetary, the economy is global. We can’t escape.

Scott: I guess we can’t. Your dad is unemployed so are millions of others, but the banks are making record profits. My dad believes in the system enough to kill for it. Obama is keeping up the dirty work for the Bilderbergers; three wars, an economy that is killing the middle class, health care that will eliminate more individual rights and will cost a fortune in money and lives, maintaining the status quo for the death industries which pretend they are helping people-big pharma and Mansanto. And no matter if it were McCain they’re all the same underneath. And the TSA is growing into the army that will kill its own citizens and secure our nation when people revolt. Meanwhile my little paper of revolt which tells more truth than all the phony textbooks all together gets me an F and a wall of resistance with people trying to fix me. It’s all a big lie and no one wants to admit that.

Gabrielle: Lying has become the way of the world. The public knows that the government lies to us but they rationalize it. Only when they are directly hurt by it do they say something. Like my dad, now that he’s lost his job he’s freakin mad as hell; you should of heard him today, you would’ve been proud. But until he lost his job he defended the status quo lies. The only lie that got people riled up was Clinton getting his dick sucked. Why did he have to lie about that in the first place, who cares?

Scott: Exactly, who cares? In the end the sun will burn out and all life will perish, unless we kill it all first. Human beings will be a blip on the animal chart that no one will read and means nothing. We all end the same, back into carbon just as we started. So who fucking cares, were all gonna die.

Gabrielle: Well I hope that before it all ends people wake up and realize that if we want true peace and happiness all we need to do is share. Weren’t we taught that as children, sharing? We’ve got enough for everyone to live with plenty of food and shelter and safety. It’s idiotic that we aren’t living that way now.

Scott: Maybe one day people will evolve and stop acting like barbarians. But I know I won’t be here to see it. But you could be a force of change Gabrielle, you really could. You’re smart and beautiful and you could use your knowledge to make change.

Gabrielle: You too, we can do it together.

Scott: Naw, I’m gonna hole up somewhere and put my blinders on and tune it all out.

Gabrielle: Yeah right! You’ll be fighting for right till the end.

Scott: The end may stop me. I can’t change what has been done.

Gabrielle: Come here you trouble maker (grabs him over) make trouble for me (kisses him and they continue).

[LIGHTS FADE]

Scene 13

(in living rooms of Walker/Pence)

Frank: Hello, Mr. Pence?

Tom: Yes?

Frank: Frank Walker here, Scott Walker’s father.

Tom: Yes of course, how do you do?

Frank: Fine, thank you. May I talk with you a few minutes?

Tom: Yes, just let me turn the radio down (turns down NPR) Okay, how can I help you Mr. Walker?

Frank: I’m concerned about Scott. My son is not acting like himself these days. I know this is still a difficult time for him; he is taking more time than we thought to overcome his mother’s death…

Tom: Yes, I am very sorry for your loss.

Frank: Thank you. We just passed the first anniversary and I thought Scott would be able to move on and find some happiness again.

Tom: Grieving is an unpredictable process sometimes.

Frank: In any case, I wanted to get your view on Scott. I know you recently flunked Scott on his final; what exactly happened there?

Tom: Scott wrote a paper that did not cover the material we learned in class; therefore I gave him an F.

Frank: Why do you think Scott did that?

Tom: Scott seems angry these days. His anger probably stems from his loss, but I am beginning to feel his anger at his country and the world runs deep and for some justified reasons.

Frank: How do you mean?

Tom: Scott knows a lot Mr. Walker. I’m not sure how he does but you have a very well informed young man who is looking deeper into issues than the news we hear.

Frank: Scott has always been this way.

Tom: Well when you see and learn about what he knows it’s easy to get angry. Personally, in my own world, with the deep budget cuts at school, I get angry myself at times. Our economy is putting many of us on edge these days.

Frank: Yes we are taking salary cuts at my firm as well, and the folks in Washington aren’t talking common sense anymore but we need to turn this thing around and a little austerity is good for all of us.

Tom: Scott wrote about how all of this is planned and he challenged me to review what he wrote and not just disregard it because it is different from what we learned.

Frank: I’m sorry Mr. Pence, Scott can sometimes forget his place and…

Tom: No need to apologize Mr. Walker. Your son is a smart student. I listen to my students especially when they’re smart. Its part of what I love about teaching and I’ve learned that young people do not always carry formalities.

Frank: Scott ought to be more polite.

Tom: Scott is polite Mr. Walker, aside from a bit of angry swearing. What I’m trying to say is Scott has got me interested in his way of viewing things in the world and in my research I see he is accurate with his facts. I may not interpret things the way Scott does but he is writing seriously about my subject and he is bringing certain facts of history into light when they have been discreetly hidden. I’m not sure how he got to all this but once I started looking its easy to find.

Frank: Scott never liked it that I kept military secrets to myself. He could never understand there are good reasons to do so to protect your family and your country. So Scott started trying to find out information on his own many years ago, and his mother home schooled him and she let him learn whatever he wanted.

Tom: That explains a lot.

Frank: I sometimes wonder if we made a mistake letting Scott try school. It has only made him more defensive and rigid. What used to be fun is now a chore. I used to take Scott to the library in fifth grade and he would drill the librarian to find books about what he wanted; hell even she liked his curiosity. And we allowed him to use the internet freely as long as we could see where he was going.

Tom: You’ve raised a smart and independent son.

Frank: I always wanted Scott to be independent. I’ve seen too much in my life that is not what we think it is and I wanted Scott to be aware of how things work. I always thought he’d follow me into engineering but he seems to have no interest and now he wants to quit school.

Tom: What?

Frank: Yes, he’s talked to his counselor already and he told me last night.

Tom: That would be a huge mistake.

Frank: Yes it would, that’s why I’m calling you. Is there anything you might do to persuade Scott to stick it out?

Tom: I don’t know…Scott has a strong mind. I’m not sure if changing his grade will make a difference…

Frank: Oh no don’t change his grade, I don’t want a handout, Scott has to be responsible for his actions. I just want you…

Tom: Mr. Walker I’ve already decided to change his grade; I made that decision yesterday. He is passing, and he deserves to. I should have talked to him before I ever graded his paper, that might have avoided all of this. It’s just not the norm to…

Frank: Mr. Pence Scott has had a rough year; it has been escalating more and more. This incident is only a part of it. You do what you feel is right, I do not want to interfere; it’s between you and Scott. I have always let Scott live his own life unless he really needs me. What I am really asking is whether you think talking to him will help and if so, I would greatly appreciate it. If I can get Scott through the next half year I am sure he will come out looking forward to college.

Tom: I will do what I can. I have a meeting scheduled with Scott and I will talk with him then when I tell him I am changing his grade. I can let you know how it goes.

Frank: Please do, and please do not let Scott know I’ve called you.

Tom: Why not?

Frank: I don’t want Scott to feel I’m interfering.

Tom: He’s your son, isn’t that okay?

Frank: Yes but it may cause more harm than good for him to know.

Tom: Mr. Walker, in all due respect sir, I believe this is exactly what Scott gets angry about; secrets, and lies. He sees no reason not to be told the truth.

Frank: Well part of maturing is understanding that harming others unnecessarily is unwarranted.

Tom: Scott would say that more harm is done by deceiving.

Frank: Well what do you think Mr. Pence?

Tom: I think this is a complicated matter sir. These are questions we must all answer for ourselves. If you want me to not say that we spoke I will honor that.

Frank: Thank you, I think it best. I appreciate your time Mr. Pence. If you can help Scott, that’s all I’m asking.

Tom: I want to help Scott; I will see how it goes.

Frank: Thank you again. Goodbye.

Tom: Goodbye…(hangs up phone and stares into it and then into space)

[LIGHTS FADE]

SCENE 14

(in the Pence’s living room)

Tom: Holy shit. (silence)

Whitney: I don’t understand how it happened….it wasn’t that time. I wasn’t fertile I know I wasn’t.

Tom: Maybe you were fertile twice last month I don’t know.

Whitney: Actually there’s a doctor researching that idea.

Tom: What?

Whitney: That women can be fertile twice a month.

Tom: How?

Whitney: He thinks that the lunar cycle you are born into stays with you throughout your life.

Tom: Like astrology?

Whitney: Yeah kind of. If you are born under a full moon, or a crescent moon or whatever, you will be fertile at that time whether it falls into your monthly cycle or not.

Tom: That’s a bit far-fetched.

Whitney: Seems so, but how can you explain all the pregnancies like this one that clearly seem out of the blue?

Tom: Are you sure you were charting accurately?

Whitney: I’ve been doing this for twelve years and successfully except the one time. I know my fluids, I know my body, I know when I’m ovulating, my temperature follows a consistent pattern each month…fuck(explodes impulsively)! How did this happen?

Tom: Not the best timing uh?

Whitney: How could we possibly afford another child?

Tom: Well one of us was going to be home anyway to home school Debby, maybe it could just be you.

Whitney: How could I home school Debby and nurse, change diapers and do everything else?

Tom: You could.

Whitney: I’m not ready for that emotionally. Nor physically. Hell I just stopped nursing Debby a year ago.

Tom: Well there’s no way I could do both.

Whitney: Not unless I pumped milk from the beginning.

Tom: Is that fair to the new child?

Whitney: Is it fair to me or us to rearrange our lives?! God what am I saying? I didn’t mean that.

Tom: I know but I was thinking the same awful thought.

Whitney: How is it that life comes down to this?

Tom: Sex brings babies.

Whitney: But why do the economics decide what we do? Or at least is the major concern…

Tom: We’ve created a god that must be prayed to and obedient to in order to get benevolence.

Whitney: It’s sick. It seems that way. If our economy isn’t growing its like life can’t be happy and keep going.

Tom: The sick part is that it has to be a dead end street. It is impossible to have an economy grow endlessly. Common sense tells you it would deplete all resources.

Whitney: We can’t just keep growing babies either.

Tom: That’s what the Bilderberg plans to depopulate are about. You wouldn’t abort would you?

Whitney: Do we want to take this on?

Tom: I love you; I’ll do whatever it takes.

Whitney: But do you want to?

Tom: I know this wasn’t our plan, but here we are.

Whitney: I can try home remedies to end it.

Tom: What do you mean?

Whitney: There are natural ways to interfere and stop the pregnancy.

Tom: How?

Whitney: Different herbs, mega-doses of vitamin C…

Tom: Vitamin C? I thought that was for flu prevention not…

Whitney: If you are diligent in the first few days you can cause a miscarriage sometimes.

Tom: How do you know about this?

Whitney: I also do my research (teasing) and I use the web. Most OB/GYN’s are boxed in in what they do. Like most doctors they do well at what they know but they don’t get a well rounded education.

Tom: Specialization has made us ignorant. That was a warning Quigley makes at the end of his book.

Whitney: Doctors seem to focus more on controlling a woman’s body then learning from it.

Tom: Well do you wanna try it, is it safe?

Whitney: Some of the herbs are riskier than others. You need constant awareness of your body when taking them to notice adverse effects immediately. The vitamin C is the safest. The worst side effects are terrible diarrhea and stomach ache.

Tom: Does it really work?

Whitney: I’ve read about many women who have done it successfully.

Tom: Is that what you want?

Whitney: I wanna be rich so I have other choices.

Tom: In the end rich or poor are just outer conditions.

Whitney: I know but it sure would make life easier.

Tom: Maybe. Maybe not.

Whitney: How not?

Tom: Once you have more money and more stuff you need to keep it and to keep it you have to maintain it and make it secure-all of which takes more time and energy and responsibility.

Whitney: So you hire more people.

Tom: More responsibility.

Whitney: Well hiring a nanny or two would help.

Tom: Give them to more strangers?

Whitney: A good nanny becomes part of the family.

Tom: What about mom and dad?

Whitney: Yeah I know I’m just teasing. We need another lifestyle to really be available and present for our children.

Tom: Hell I can hardly find enough time for all my students even.

Whitney: You invest too much for this system; you have too many students to give time to.

Tom: But they need it just like Debby, they need real attention.

Whitney: How is Scott doing?

Tom: I’m meeting with him today.

Whitney: What did you decide?

Tom: I’m giving him an A.

Whitney: Wow, really, why such a change?

Tom: Because he was right.

Whitney: About what?

Tom: About his information in his paper. It’s another way of interpreting history but it is accurate.

Whitney: Really? So he really knows what he’s talking about?

Tom: Listen, anyone who can paraphrase Quigley and at such a young age knows what they’re talking about. It’s not by accident he was President Clinton’s mentor in college. His alma mater is Harvard, and he taught there and Princeton and Georgetown. He was even a consultant to the Department of Defense.

Whitney: Why doesn’t everybody read him then, why don’t we teach his work in schools?

Tom: What he wrote is anathema to most historians who have a conservative bent. Quigley was actually in accord with the secret society he wrote about, was a part of the network and felt too that the masses should be ruled by the elite. But he wanted it out in the open, not secret.

Whitney: Textbook publishers are beholden to profits like everyone else.

Tom: Like the Texas Board of Education?

Whitney: Exactly.

Tom: So they want to sell books and the Board of Ed says this is the kind of book we want and …

Whitney: Then we get a conservative text of history, politics and economy rather than the facts, just because there are more Republicans on the board and they feel the curriculum is too far on the Left.

Tom: History is written by the victors as Churchill said, and the victors always have the most capital.

Whitney: What about you, can you use his writing to teach with?

Tom: It would make eyes roll and probably get me fired. But I can grade Scott’s paper based on it and validate his sense of individualism which is in fact the bedrock of this country.

Whitney: Good for you, I admire that. You’re actually learning from your student.

Tom: Scott is unlike any student I’ve ever had; he has taught me a lot. I would be proud if Debby were to follow his footsteps.

Whitney: Debby is already independent and that’s part of her “problem” in school. Let’s talk more tonight, Gotta run, work calls. Slave to the economy that I am, I must leave you (teasing). Bye my love (kisses him)

Tom: (kisses her) Bye sweetheart, see you tonight.

Scene 15

(in classroom Tom at computer waiting for Scott to arrive)

(SILENCE)

(SILENCE)

(Tom looks at watch, and stares out into space)

(SILENCE)

(Tom checks his cell phone)

(SILENCE)

(SILENCE)

(restless, Tom starts to clean his computer screen)

(SILENCE)

(Scott does not show up)

[LIGHTS FADE SLOWLY AS TOM SITS AND STARES OUT IN UNEASE]

Scene 16

(Scott’s funeral)

Father Joe: Scott Walker was a child of God and like all of God’s children had to find his way on this earth. For some of God’s children this is not an easy pilgrimage. For us left behind, we feel the utter incomprehensibleness of an act that creates such a hole in our lives: a loss beyond words. But the spirit of God is yet with us, in us, and is the guiding force that will allow us to forgive, accept, and move forward.

Scott had an independence about him that gave him strength of character even while it often separated him from others. When Scott lost his mother, not so long ago, God was testing him. God does indeed work in strange ways. We cannot know his ways we can only submit. Scott kept a vibrant spirit and harbored no ill will towards God. Scott sorted through his questions with integrity and the searching of a true soldier of God.

In the end Scott took his life for his own reasons. Let us not judge nor condemn an act we cannot understand. Let us pray to the Almighty for peace in our hearts to allow time for healing; in time we find healing. In keeping the fire of love in our hearts we will walk the path of Jesus. In Jesus Christ we find the answers to our earthly condition; Jesus is the way.

Dearly beloved, walk hand in hand through these troubling times; remember to forgive as you struggle through your daily duties without Scott. Stop and breathe and bring God into your hearts. Pressure youselves not. Go slow. Take time. Do the things that make you happy. Sitting in pain is like locking yourself in a straight-jacket. Get out, see a movie, watch a game, be with others, even as it is difficult. Know that you are not alone. Seek counsel with the angels of God, bring them into your hearts; they are everywhere and filled with light.

Scott Walker was a good son, a fine student, a friend who shared his love. May he rest in peace. Amen.

[BLACK OUT]

THE END