12/7/23
Newsletter #526
The Crack of Dawn
There used to be a huge, well-known, somewhat nefarious, insane asylum that was in Pontiac, Michigan (mere blocks from where I presently sit), which opened in 1878. Known by several names, The Eastern Michigan Asylum for the Insane, then Pontiac State Hospital, then finally, Clinton Valley Center. It was demolished in the year 2000. It’s now the location of a sprawling subdivision. However, right in the middle of the property is a fairly new brick office building that houses the last remains – or intentions – of the insane asylum. It is the home of the Oakland County Sheriff’s Dept. drug-screening center, a place I would, in time, visit many times.
When my sisters and I were little kids of five, six or seven, and my authority-less, utterly unprepared Hungarian grandmother was left in charge of us, and we acted like hooligans, as we might, she would yell at us in her thick Hungarian accent, “You should go to Poontiac!” meaning to the insane asylum.
So, in 2011, at the age 53, I found myself locked up in the psychiatric ward at St. Joseph-Mercy Hospital in Pontiac, Michigan. The modern-day version of an insane asylum. The city of Pontiac was renowned as the place where they used to make Pontiac automobiles, and of course for its enormous insane asylum. And here I was, fulfilling my grandmother’s childhood curse on me. This is where she said I should go, and I had.
St. Joe’s psychiatric ward – known as “6 West” or just, “The 6th Floor” or, most accurately, “The Looney Bin” – was one of at least three locked psychiatric facilities in Pontiac. Even though the asylum was torn down, Pontiac was still the place where they sent the nuts in Michigan. The psychiatric ward was under the supervision of a psychiatrist named Dr. Kakar, a short, squat, chubby man from New Delhi, India, who wore ill-matching suits and ties. I think the place held about 30-50 unwilling “clients” at any one time. Dr. Kakar was able to “examine” and make a diagnose every inmate in the place in less than 30 minutes. He achieved this by allotting each person 60 seconds. He would stroll up – wearing striped pants and a checked coat – holding a clipboard and ask each person (with his Apu-like accent), “How are you feeling today?” I’d say, “Fine.” He’d ask, “Do you feel homicidal?” Me: “No.” Dr. K: “Do you feel suicidal?” Me: “No.” Dr. K: “Okay then,” and he’d move on to the next client. Diagnosis done. Me, and most everybody else, would ask his retreating figure, “When do I get out of here?” And he’d generally respond, “We’ll see.”
One day I tried to change things up. When Dr. Kakar asked, “How are you feeling today?” I replied, “Terrific. I feel really good.” His eyes widened, “You feel really good?” I said, “Yes, I do.” He nodded, wrote on his clipboard and spoke at the same time, “That is called ‘manic behavior’ and I will now put you on the medication, Lamictal.” I guess I gave the wrong answer. I asked, “When do I get out of here?” He said, “Now we have to wait to give the Lamictal a few more days and see what happens.”
I became buddies with a 45-year-old black dude, also named Anthony, who was funny as hell, and had lived within a mile of several of my apartments in the shitty part of Hollywood, so we both knew the same turf. Anthony had what looked like an ice cream scoop of his head removed from his forehead and the wound was fresh, and moist, but not covered with a bandage. It was difficult not to stare at it. He explained that he had been receiving “blunt force trauma wounds” to his head his entire life and this was just the latest. There had been at least five other serious ones. The first was when he was five years old. Anthony was in a car with his mother. He was in back, leaning forward between the two front seats, when his mom had to jam on the brakes hard, little Anthony flew forward. As he said, “This was back when everything in a car was made of metal.” Five “blunt force trauma wounds” later, here he was in the nuthouse, with a scoop of his head missing. But he was ridiculously funny, and always upbeat, although he was never 100% sure of where he was. One day as Dr. Kakar walked past, in plaid pants and a striped coat, Anthony blurted out, “Do you dress yourself in the morning?” Dr. Kakar froze in his tracks, didn’t turn around, and said, “I’ll take that as a compliment,” and kept walking.
There were two different kinds of inmates: the ones who could attend group therapy sessions; and the ones who were instead given coloring books. There was also a sub-group, to which I belonged, of drunks who had frightened their families, mostly by saying that they would kill themselves, all of them failures. Part of this group was a fellow named Rob, who was about fifty, a successful business-owner, drove a BMW, and was the only person to use the yoga mats and do calisthenics every day. Rob had not threatened suicide. Rob had gotten himself so drunkenly pissed off – he had a pretty wife and a pretty ten-year-old daughter – that he came home from work one day, drunk as hell, pushed past his wife and kid, went up to his bedroom, opened the window and began throwing out the furniture. His driveway was located directly below the bedroom window. Rob described the satisfaction of seeing and hearing the dresser and side tables smash to pieces. Then, for good measure, once he’s thrown all of the furniture out the window, he went down and drove back and forth across the wreckage in his BMW. Thus, he scared his wife, she called the police, and thus, there he was in the looney bin.
And I was put on Lamictal for being too happy.
That was just the beginning of my summer in 2011.
Have a nice day.
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