Pushing 20 cents around...
This edition is a true pair-of-dimes shift in how this newsletter is published. In the past, what came out of the envelope was all you got from me. This year, things are a little different. What you’ve opened up before you is not a folded piece of paper, but a doorway to a live, ever-evolving, interactive newsletter. What I realized in writing about the past year is that if I truly wanted to write everything about it that I wanted to, it would end up being 12-14 pages at least, the largest newsletter in Ben Wisdom’s history and involving a murderous amount of postage. And, since I have just recently opened up my “Page Home” to all, I figured that I would provide the a simple outline of a most complicated year here on these paper pages, and the full story as I have time to write it on those electronic pages. So get the gist of things here, and watch my Page-Home
carefully and weekly for posted articles going into more detail on what you are about to read. Well, without further editorializing, strap yourselves in, because believe it or not, this is just a summary...
2001: A Spacy Odyssey (abridged)
On January 6th, I saw the movie “Cast Away” and found myself strangely identifying with the main character, feeling uncommonly adrift and isolated. Three days later, I met a girl who called herself “Ruth” -- as in “Ruth seeks Boaz” -- on the internet. Leanne (her real name) replied in a few days, and we began a most remarkable correspondence.
For most of February and March, I stayed up too late writing e-mail. In mid-February, I had my “Wisdom” teeth out --the back four, anyway. (Rim-shot) On February 27th, I took the GRE for the first time. I did pretty decently on the verbal and math portions, but totally tanked on the analytical portion. It isn’t really any wonder, since I didn’t study a whit for it ahead of time. The same evening I took the test, I packed and the family flew to Phoenix, AZ for a celebration of my mother’s parents 50th anniversary and my grandmother’s 70th birthday. A good time was had by all, and I found the trip to be very relaxing and even inspiring (see back page).
After a delightful week, we returned to Columbia in early March. I had a happy birthday on the 19th, because I finally finished the latest edition of my newsletter. I managed to distribute it to all my local friends, but sadly the rest of them sat on my desk for a few more months, while I was tossed about on the waves of circumstance.
After two months of correspondence, Leanne invited me to a “shape-note” singing in Carrollton, GA. After about 10 minutes of initial “oops-we’re-not-online-we’re-really-here” awkwardness, we got along smashingly. After the singing, I was invited over to Grandma’s house for dinner. The family was pleasant enough, and my surreality sirens were going off in a melodious manner. In late March, I started to feel the beginnings of what I eventually learned was Restless Legs Syndrome. On the last day of March, I was invited over to Leanne’s parents’ house, which is near Greenville. After a mostly pleasant day, I drew Leanne’s father aside and asked him if I could court Leanne. He said no, I couldn’t, because I am a Presbyterian, but I was welcome to come back next weekend if I wanted. The next day was April Fool’s day.
Leanne came with her parents to hear my church choir sing the Easter portion of the Handel’s Messiah on Palm Sunday evening, and two days later, I took the GRE for the second time. I had practiced analytical problems all month, so I was satisfied with the score I achieved that evening. I preregistered for the GA Tech Distance Learning master’s degree Electrical Engineering program.
Starting in late April, I stayed up late writing e-mail but for a totally different reason. Leanne and I mutually agreed to put “us” on hold until she was safe and sane. I wore myself quite thin in those days, and it was only a matter of time before something happened. On May 3rd, something did: I had my first ever car accident-- a rear-ending that was fairly slow speed but was totally my fault. The next weekend I visited Leanne’s family in a rental car.
By May, I and my parents had finally helped Leanne to see that it was okay to leave the cult, but that in order to leave the cult she’d probably have to leave her family’s house, too. The second weekend in May I went Shape-Note singing with them all again, this time at Furman University. Whenever we managed to get out alone, we would brainstorm and conspire about how exactly she should leave. On Memorial Day weekend, I sent in my application to Georgia Tech. On Memorial Day, my brothers and I took a most enchanting trip to one of our childhood homes, Fort Benning, GA. One week later, Leanne jumped.
With Leanne safe at a friend’s house, I finally found time to send the Spring 2001 newsletter to all of my out-of-town friends. A few days later, Leanne came to Columbia to assist the authorities in any way she could to bring to the cult leader to justice. Halfway through June, my mom drove her up to a cult-recovery center up in rural Ohio, and on the same day I got a letter from GA Tech regretting to inform me.
She was there for a total of three weeks. Every other evening or so, I would call her on the phone to talk and to read a chapter out of the first book in Tolkien’s “Lord of the Rings” trilogy, and we both marveled at the parallelisms to the plot of that book with her situation. On Independence day I watched a Twilight Zone marathon on and off all day long, wondered how I would write about all this, and took some small comfort in a small fragment of rainbow in the sky that I saw that afternoon.
The next weekend, I went up with Mom to pick up Leanne at Wellspring. We had a knock-down-drag-out session with the resident psychologist, over what the future held for Leanne. She came back with us to Columbia, and stayed at another friends house, while plans were made and executed. Halfway through July, I said good-bye to Leanne, who was leaving to stay with friends on the other side of Greenville. It was at that time my mind split right down the middle, over what to do and how to feel about her. The third week in July, I went on the second annual company white-water rafting trip and got to escape for a bit. After this, I realized that in order to put my mind back together, my heart had to break. At the end of the month, I wrote Leanne and told her that I was very glad to have gained a sister as a result of the ordeal, but a brother was all that I would ever be, and it was enough. I was very sad that weekend, but even then a glint of hope shimmered through the gloom, as I realized that I might actually be accepted into this Southeastern culture.
