The Very Best of F & SF v1 (13 page)

I feel that
this, in itself, is an important discovery.

As long as I am
able to write, I will continue to record my thoughts in these progress reports.
It is one of my few pleasures. However, by all indications, my own mental
deterioration will be very rapid.

I have already
begun to notice signs of emotional instability and forgetfulness, the first
symptoms of burnout.

June
10
Deterioration progressing. I have become
absent-minded. Algernon died two days ago. Dissection shows my predictions were
right. His brain has decreased in weight.

I guess the same
thing is or will soon be happening to me. Now that it’s definite, I don’t want
it to happen. I put Algernon’s body in a cheese box and buried him in the back
yard. I cried.

June 15
Dr. Strauss came to see me again. I wouldn’t open the door and I
told him to go away. I want to be left to myself. I have become touchy and
irritable. I feel the darkness closing in. It’s hard to throw off thoughts of
suicide. I keep telling myself how important this introspective journal will
be.

It’s a strange
sensation to pick up a book that you’ve read and enjoyed just a few months ago
and discover that you don’t remember it. I remembered how great I thought John
Milton was, but when I picked up
Paradise Lost,
I couldn’t understand it at all.
I got so angry I threw the book across the room.

I’ve got to try
to hold on to some of it. Some of the things I’ve learned. Oh, God, please don’t
take it all away.

June
19
Sometimes, at night, I go out for a walk.
Last night I couldn’t remember where I lived. A policeman took me home. I have
the strange feeling that this has all happened to me before—a long time ago. I
keep telling myself I’m the only person in the world who can describe what’s
happening to me.

June
21
Why can’t I remember? I’ve got to fight. I
lie in bed for days and I don’t know who or where I am. Then it all comes back
to me in a flash. Fugues of amnesia. Symptoms of senility—second childhood. I
can watch them coming on. It’s so cruelly logical. I learned so much and so
fast. Now my mind is
deteriorating rapidly. I won’t let
it happen. I’ll fight it. I can’t help thinking of the boy in the restaurant,
the blank expression, the silly smile, the people laughing at him.
No—please—not that again....

June 22
I’m forgetting things that I learned recently. It seems to be
following the classic pattern—the last things learned are the first things
forgotten. Or is that the pattern?

I’d better look
it up again....

I reread my
paper on the
Algernon-Gordon
Effect
and
I get the strange feeling that it was written by someone else.
There are parts I don’t even understand.

Motor activity
impaired. I keep tripping over things, and it becomes increasingly difficult to
type.

June
23
I’ve given up using the typewriter completely. My
coordination is bad. I feel that I’m moving slower and slower. Had a terrible
shock today. I picked up a copy of an article I used in my research, Krueger’s
Uber psychische Ganzheit
,
to see if it would help me understand what I had done. First I thought there
was something wrong with my eyes. Then I realized I could no longer read
German. I tested myself in other languages. All gone.

June 30
A week since I dared to write again. It’s slipping away like sand
through my fingers. Most of the books I have are too hard for me now. I get
angry with them because I know that I read and understood them just a few weeks
ago.

I keep telling
myself I must keep writing these reports so that somebody will know what is
happening to me. But it gets harder to form the words and remember spellings. I
have to look up even simple words in the dictionary now and it makes me
impatient with myself.

Dr. Strauss comes
around almost every day, but I told him I wouldn’t see or speak to anybody. He
feels guilty. They all do. But I don’t blame anyone. I knew what might happen.
But how it hurts.

July
7
I don’t know where the week went. Today’s Sunday I know
becuase I can see through my window people going to church. I think I stayed in
bed all week but I remember Mrs. Flynn bringing food to me a few times. I keep
saying over and over ive got to do something but then I forget or maybe its
just easier not to do what I say Im going to do.

I think of my
mother and father a lot these days. I found a picture of them with me taken at
a beach. My father has a big ball under his arm and my mother is holding me by
the hand. I dont remember them the way they are in the picture. All I remember
is my father drunk most of the time and arguing with mom about money.

He never shaved
much and he used to scratch my face when he hugged me. My mother said he died
but Cousin Miltie said he heard his mom and dad say that my father ran away
with another woman. When I asked my mother she slapped my face and said my
father was dead. I dont think I ever found out which was true but I don’t care
much. (He said he was going to take me to see cows on a farm once but he never
did. He never kept his promises...)

July
10
My landlady Mrs Flynn is very worried about
me. She says the way I lay around all day and dont do anything I remind her of
her son before she threw him out of the house. She said she doesnt like
loafers. If Im sick its one thing, but if Im a loafer thats another thing and
she wont have it. I told her I think Im sick.

I try to read a
little bit every day, mostly stories, but sometimes I have to read the same
thing over and over again because I dont know what it means. And its hard to
write. I know I should look up all the words in the dictionary but its so hard
and Im so tired all the time.

Then I got the
idea that I would only use the easy words instead of the long hard ones. That
saves time. I put flowers on Algernons grave about once a week. Mrs Flynn
thinks Im crazy to put flowers on a mouses grave but I told her that Algernon
was special.

July
14
Its Sunday again. I dont have anything to do
to keep me busy now because my television set is broke and I dont have any
money to get it fixed. (I think I lost this months check from the lab. I dont
remember)

I get awful
headaches and asperin doesnt help me much. Mrs Flynn knows Im really sick and
she feels very sorry for me. Shes a wonderful woman whenever someone is sick.

July
22
Mrs Flynn called a strange doctor to see me.
She was afraid I was going to die. I told the doctor I wasnt too sick and that
I only forget sometimes. He asked me did I have any friends or relatives and I
said no I dont have any. I told him I had a friend called Algernon once but he
was a mouse and we used to run races together. He looked at me kind of funny
like he thought I was crazy.

He smiled when I
told him I used to be a genius. He talked to me like I was a baby and he winked
at Mrs Flynn. I got mad and chased him out because he was making fun of me the
way they all used to.

July
24
I have no more money and Mrs Flynn says I got
to go to work somewhere and pay the rent because I havent paid for over two
months. I dont know any work but the job I used to have at Donnegans Plastic
Box Company I dont want to go back there because they all knew me when I was
smart and maybe theyll laugh at me. But I dont know what else to do to get
money.

July
25 I was looking at some of my old progress reports and its very
funny but I cant read what I wrote. I can make out some of the words but they
dont make sense.

Miss Kinnian
came to the door but I said go away I dont want to see you. She cried and I
cried too but I wouldnt let her in because I didnt want her to laugh at me. I
told her I didn’t like her any more. I told her I didnt want to be smart any
more. Thats not true. I still love her and I still want to be smart but I had
to say that so shed go away. She gave Mrs Flynn money to pay the rent. I dont
want that. I got to get a job.

Please... please
let me not forget how to read and write...

July
27
Mr Donnegan was very nice when I came back
and asked him for my old job of janitor. First he was very suspicious but I
told him what happened to me then he looked very sad and put his hand on my
shoulder and said Charlie Gordon you got guts.

Everybody looked
at me when I came downstairs and started working in the toilet sweeping it out
like I used to. I told myself Charlie if they make fun of you dont get sore
because you remember their not so smart as you once thot they were. And besides
they were once your friends and if they laughed at you that doesnt mean
anything because they liked you too.

One of the new
men who came to work there after I went away made a nasty crack he said hey
Charlie I hear your a very smart fella a real quiz kid. Say something
intelligent. I felt bad but Joe Carp came over and grabbed him by the shirt and
said leave him alone you lousy cracker or I’ll break your neck. I didnt expect Joe
to take my part so I guess hes really my friend.

Later Frank
Reilly came over and said Charlie if anybody bothers you or trys to take
advantage you call me or Joe and we will set em straight. I said thanks Frank
and I got choked up so I had to turn around and go into the supply room so he
wouldnt see me cry. Its good to have friends.

July
28
I did a dumb thing today I forgot I wasnt in
Miss Kinnians class at the adult center any more like I use to be. I went in
and sat down in my old seat in the back of the room and she looked at me funny
and she said Charles. I dint remember she ever called me that before only
Charlie so I said hello Miss Kinnian Im redy for my lesin today only I lost my
reader that we was using. She startid to cry and run out of the room and
everybody looked at me and I saw they wasnt the same pepul who used to be in my
class.

Then all of a
suddin I rememberd some things about the operashun and me getting smart and I
said holy smoke I reely pulled a Charlie Gordon that time. I went away before
she come back to the room.

Thats why Im
going away from New York for good. I dont want to do nothing like that agen. I
dont want Miss Kinnian to feel sorry for me. Evry body feels sorry at the
factery and I dont want that eather so Im going someplace where nobody knows
that Charlie Gordon was once a genus and now he cant even reed a book or rite
good.

Im taking a
cuple of books along and even if I cant reed them I’ll practise hard and maybe
I wont forget every thing I lerned. If I try reel hard maybe I’ll be a littel
bit smarter then I was before the operashun. I got my rabits foot and my luky
penny and maybe they will help me.

If you ever reed
this Miss Kinnian dont be sorry for me Im glad I got a second chanse to be
smart becaus I lerned a lot of things that I never even new were in this world
and Im grateful that I saw it all for a littel bit. I dont know why Im dumb
agen or what I did wrong maybe its becaus I dint try hard enuff. But if I try
and practis very hard maybe I’ll get a littl smarter and know what all the
words are. I remember a littel bit how nice I had a feeling with the blue book
that has the torn cover when I red it. Thats why Im gonna keep trying to get
smart so I can have that feeling agen. Its a good feeling to know things and be
smart. I wish I had it rite now if I did I would sit down and reed all the
time. Anyway I bet Im the first dumb person in the
world
who ever found out somthing importent for sience. I remember I did somthing but
I dont remember what. So I gess its like I did it for all the dumb pepul like
me.

Good-by Miss
Kinnian and Dr Strauss and evreybody. And P.S. please tell Dr Nemur not to be
such a grouch when pepul laff at him and he woud have more frends. Its easy to
make frends if you let pepul laff at you. Im going to have lots of frends where
I go.

P.P.S. Please if
you get a chanse put some flowrs on Algernons grave in the bak yard...

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