S1L40 – “What’s a lucid interval?” as distinguished from temporary insanity
Good evening ladies and gentlemen, welcome to our class tonight. I will be your instructor and it is my honor to impart some useful information to all of you tonight that, hopefully, would help you fulfill your destiny as future lawyers and officers of the court…”
I love the look on my students’ faces when I surprise them by saying something stiff and formal and off the wall like this. They look like they’ve been bitten by a black mamba or some other highly-venomous king cobra. Their eyes look big and perfectly round—like those plastic bubble eyes they glue onto stuffed toys, where the little black pupils jiggle around inside the bubble as you shake the toy. They all just look like deer caught in headlights, totally confused and not sure what to do.
“It looks like him, but I don’t think it’s him!” Deema whispers to her seatmate Hannah, who whispers back, “is he alright??”
“Oh, there you are, Miss ‘Palindrome’ Hannah Maala! What a wonderful pleasure to have your company tonight,” I said with a wry Dr. Seuss pussycat smile.
“Would you please privilege us with hearing your wonderful voice in response to a query from your humble professor?”
“Y-y-y-yeees, of course, sir,” Hannah answered without batting an eyelash.
“Would you be kind enough to distribute your weight evenly on two lower bipod appendages, please?” I said with a Mr. Bean tone of voice.
“Tumayo ka raw,” Cabo Buhan, the pre-med dude from Dagupan whispered, “bipod appendages yung dalawang paa mo yun…!”
“Oh, I’m so sorry, sir! I forgot to—” Hannah sprung to her feet without taking her wide-open eyes off me as I cut her short.
“Oh, there’s no necessity for conveying an apology, madam, I’m sure your consciousness is gainfully preoccupied with some essential thoughts at this moment,” I said, trying to sound like an English butler.
“I say! I say!” Kata, the English major, shouted from somewhere in the back, obviously getting the joke, eliciting muffled laughter from the class. Hannah, however, is still confused.
“Will the gracious lady from Abatan, Buguias please tell us the current state of the weather, please?” I said as I leaned on the blackboard with one arm and crossed my legs.
“The weather?? You want me to describe the weather at night? sir?”
“And the madam’s reply is….?” I put the pressure on.
“Oh, I’m sorry, sir. It’s…uh…its probably overcast…uh… with the temperature about…I don’t know…18…19 degrees? Sir?””
“Wonderful!” I said, “and in the impending celebration in observance of the coming of the Messiah, has madam thought of any particular present to requisition from a jolly fat gentleman from the North Pole in red robes?” I said with my chin up.
“What… do I want…from Santa Claus… this Christmas? Is that the question, sir?” Hannah put the pieces of the cryptic question together.
“And Princess Diana’s response is….?” I pushed again.
“World peace, sir! Definitely world peace! …and..uh..goodwill to men? Sir?”
“Good answer! Good answer!” several of her classmates said alternatingly from different parts of the room.
“Phenomenal! Now, I wonder if the Iron lady from Parliament might have an opinion regarding what color of lipstick is the most appropriate to wear at the Queen Mother’s thanksgiving banquet?” I said, looking at Hannah with one eye bigger than the other.
“Wow…!” Hannah sighed with a palindrome, unable to believe how fast and furious the curveballs kept coming, “I would hazard a guess of…uh…pink or fuschia? Sir?”
“How extraordinary!” I said, employing the correct Victorian era phrase for the occasion, “but would the Fierce Lioness of the Jewish nation tell us why we must never again allow fascism to rear its ugly head?” I said.
Hannah looked stunned for a moment, then slowly recovered, “Golda Meir? You want me to quote the first Israeli woman prime minister, Golda Meir? Sir?”
“I’m sorry, madam, only kosher answers please…”
“Oh..! Ah, yes, sir…because… every human life is equivalent to the life… of all humanity? I mean, he who saves one life… saves the world entire? Sir?”
“I think that quote is from the Talmud, not Golda Meir,” Deema interrupted—again without being called.
“Really?” I said as I threw Deema a sharp rebuking look, “I thought it was from the movie ‘Schindler’s List’ but would Miss Deema Niwala please annoy us with the exercise of her vocal chords only upon being called to do so next time, please?”
“Sowree…” Fake apology.
“Apology accepted,” I snapped, “In fact, by way of due restitution accruing from her disruptive wrongdoing, perhaps Miss Deema should regale us with her comprehension of our current situation, taking into consideration the substance of my previous memorable conversation with Miss Palindrome…?”
Hah, I thought, let me see her hit this mother of curveballs. Hannah sat down, Deema stood up and took over recitation.
“Imperceptible insanity, sir. You were trying to demonstrate ‘imperceptible insanity’ sometimes also referred to as imbecility. It’s when a person behaves in a seemingly rational manner but a close examination of his actions reveals a complete detachment from reason so subtle as to escape ordinary cognizance.” Deema said calmly and rationally.
I have no idea why this girl chose nursing as her first profession. But she definitely missed her true calling. Whenever she recites, it’s like listening to an e-book version of the Revised Penal Code. And I didn’t even clue her in that I was in Article 12, listing the exempting circumstances affecting criminal liability.
“And why would you say that Miss Palindrome and I were acting in the manner characteristic of imbecility, Miss Deema?”
“Oh, no, no, no, sir—ooops!” Deema suddenly remembered my injunction against her copying my mannerism. Or she’s doing it on purpose to add to my annoyance.
“I mean, I didn’t say both of you were acting like an imbecile. ONLY YOU were acting like an imbecile, sir” the whole class gasped and went, “Oooooh…!”
“–and, meanwhile, Miss Hannah was unable to perceive that you were acting like an imbecile and so she persisted in trying to answer your increasingly irrational questions, sir.”
“My, oh, my!” I said, “and what indicia were present that suggested to you any detachment from reason on my part, Miss Deema?” I said, a little pissed off. I still can’t believe she hit that last curveball. I pitch that curveball every semester and NOBODY catches even a piece of it.
“Well, sir, your manner of speech tonight is uncharacteristically over formal, you couldn’t stay consistent on subject from one point of query to the next, and although the same person Miss Hannah was standing in front of you the whole time, you successively associated her identity with Princess Diana, Margaret Thatcher, Queen Elizabeth, Golda Meir and other dead women not present, sir.” Deema justified her already perfect enough answer.
“Ah! So what you’re saying, Miss Deema, is that had I committed a felony in the last 20 minutes, I would have perfect grounds to invoke the defense of imperceptible insanity or imbecility, and under Article 12, paragraph 1 of your Revised Penal Code I can be entitled to an exempting circumstance that will excuse me from serving the imposable penalty for my crime! What a wonderful world, like Louis Armstrong said.” I came down for a smooth runway landing.
“No, sir.” Deema said. Oops…some last minute turbulence?
“No? No?? N-O??” I spelled put the word ‘NO’ for emphasis.
“No, sir, because right after your irrational conversation with Miss Hannah, you and I continued with a conversation that was totally rational, consistent on topic and completely framed in reason and with such cognitive precision you could even recall which specific article in the Revised Penal Code we are talking about.”
“Right,” I said, “and that shows that my insanity comes and goes and, in accordance with law, I should be confined in an appropriate institution to be administered the proper medical treatment, right Miss Deema?”
In my mind, I could visualize Deema raising her left leg up, stretching her right arm back, curling the fingers of her right hand in a secret way as she clutched a baseball, and about to throw me a wicked curveball of her own.
“WRONG, sir. It means inspite of your imbecility, you are capable of acting rationally during a LUCID INTERVAL, so you’re not entitled to the exempting circumstance. You shall be confined in a regular jail and not a comfortable mental pavilion.”
BOOM!
She threw the pitch—and the darned thing wasn’t even a curveball. It was a fastball that sailed straight right across the middle of homeplate–I swung and I missed!
I thought, so what? It’s salty, that’s all. It’s how egg on your face tastes like. But it’s just egg, it washes off easy. I was interrupted in my introspective reverie by Deema.
“Are you alright, sir? Aren’t you going to dismiss us formally, sir?”
“Ah, yes, of course!” I said, finally resting my British stiff upper lip, “you guys can split…I mean…you can go…go home…go wherever it is you go this time of night… Sayonara!!!”
About the Author
The author is a writer and lawyer based in Baguio City, Philippines. Former editor of the Gold Ore and Baguio City Digest, professor of journalism, political science and law at Baguio Colleges Foundation (BCF). He is a photographer and video documentarist. He has a YouTube channel called “Parables and Reason”
About Images: Some of the images used in the articles are from the posts in Atty. Joel Rodriguez Dizon’s Facebook account, and/or Facebook groups and pages he manages or/and member of.