I have a group of twelve rooms staying in the hotel tonight where the majority of them are mentally handicapped. They had just come back from an activity (I think they went to Oglebay’s Festival of Lights) and were hanging out in the lobby until the two group leaders could organize them in whatever way they had to.
One of the mentally handicapped gentlemen came up to the desk and immediately turned and stared out the window for a few seconds. He turned to face me and placed his hands on the desk, then he looked at me for a few seconds, glanced back out the window just to be sure, turned back to me and said, “It’s raining.”
I smiled and replied, “Yeah, it’s really coming down.”
The gentleman grinned at me and repeated (albeit more excitedly), “Yeah, it’s really coming down!”
He then backed away from the desk, but kept his eyes on me the entire time. At that point the group leader responsible for him asked him, “Do you think it is time to go back to the room, Mikey?”
Mikey replied, “Yeah, it’s really coming down!”
“What is?”
At this point I was pretty happy because Mikey seemed to be excited about learning a new phrase. I haven’t really had the opportunity to be around mentally handicapped people since high school when I chose volunteering with the mentally handicapped students over taking a mandatory study hall. (I still have no idea why they made a study hall mandatory that semester for everyone except people who absolutely needed another credit to graduate)
Mikey gave serious thought to the question. He pursed his lips, he narrowed his eyes, he furrowed his brows. In short, he concentrated more than I can remember concentrating on anything in recent memory. Finally, he replied, “I don’t know,” he gestured to me and continued, “He knows, he told me.”
The group leader looked at me somewhat suspiciously and asked, “Sir, what is really coming down?”
I cocked my head at him thinking the answer should be obvious to him and stated, “The rain.”
Mikey chimed in, “The rain. Yeah, it’s really coming down!”
“Yes it is,” the group leader said to Mikey.
After everybody had gotten settled back in their rooms the group leader came to me to get some quarters for the snack machine. I asked him, “Mikey sure seemed nice, is he always that friendly?”
The group leader’s face took on a mildly annoyed look as he asked, “Why, did he bother you?”
“No,” I replied, “I just said that he was friendly.”
The group leader said, “Oh,” and walked away.
As he passed by on his return to his room (other end of the hall) from the snack machine he said, “I guess I should thank you,”
“For what?”
“Mikey can’t stay in a room by himself because he has no control over his bladder, and I happened to draw a room with him. All I have heard since we got back to the room is, ‘It’s really coming down.’”
“He says, ‘Yeah,’ first,” I replied.
“What?”
“He doesn’t say, 'It’s really coming down,” he says, “Yeah, it’s really coming down,” I responded.
“I guess he does,” said the group leader, “Annoying all the same, good night.”
“Good night.”
Thinking about it a few minutes later, I smiled, at least Mikey is happy.
