Vacations

[Lisa]

When the teacher asked her young charges to put down some
thoughts about their recent vacations, here's the essay one of
them read out:

"We visited Grandma and Grandpa. They used to live in a really
big brick house up here, but then Grandpa got re tarded and they
moved to Florida. Now they live in a place with a lot of other
re tarded people.

"They ride tricycles down there, and everybody wears name tags -
I guess that's because they don't know who they are. They go to
a big building called a wrecked hall, but if it was wrecked, they got it fixed because it's all right now. They play games and do exercises there, but they don't do them very well. There is a swimming pool there. They go into it and just stand there wearing their hats. I guess they don't know how to swim, either.

"As you go into the park, you see a doll house with a little man
sitting in it. He watches everybody who comes in. When they can
sneak out, they go to the beach and look for seashells that they
call "dollars."

"My Grandma used to bake cookies and stuff, but I guess she forgot how. Nobody cooks, they just eat out. They eat the same thing every night: It's called "Early Birds."

"Some of the people are so re tarded that they don't know how to cook at all, I guess. That's probably why my Grandma and Grandpa bring food into the wrecked hall. They call it 'POT LUCK.'

"My Grandma says Grandpa worked all his life and earned his
retardment. I sure wish they would move back up here, but I
guess the little man in the doll house won't let them out."