One thing that doesn’t happen so much now that Laughing Boy is sixteen, is endless (often meaningless) appointments with professionals.  Countless hours have been spent travelling, waiting and meeting a range of different people in different settings.  One series of appointments, four years ago,  was with a psychologist geezer (Psych Sid*) about LB’s ‘challenging’ behaviour.  These appointments seemed particularly pointless as Psych didn’t want LB present.  

One appointment day, LB had an inset day so I thought great!  Good opportunity for Psych and LB to meet. I told LB where we were going, and to give him credit, he went upstairs and put on his ELC police tabard (age 2), his baseball cap and his orange binoculars.  Dressed to impress, we set off to the clinic.

Psych Sid was surprised by LB’s presence and told him to do some drawing at a small table.  There followed an awkward 30 mins where Psych asked me questions and I’d say “Well, why don’t you ask him?”  Nah. As the appointment drew to a painful close, Psych asked LB to show him what he had drawn.  LB came over with a piece of paper covered in neat brown lines.  “Ah, lovely”, said Psych Sid. “Is that a picture of Mum?”  “No,” said LB, “It’s a lot of brown lines”.

Reconstructed picture by LB (less neat this time)...

* Pseudonym