Thursday, October 26, 2017

The Friday 56


Rules:
*Grab a book, any book.
*Turn to page 56 or 56% in your eReader
(If you have to improvise, that's ok.)
*Find any sentence, (or few, just don't spoil it)
*Post it.


From Rosemary: The Hidden Kennedy Daughter by Kate Clifford Larson.  This is the biography of Rosemary, JFK's sister, born in 1918. It was obvious to her family that Rosie was "different" (slow and physically uncoordinated). As she watched her younger brothers and sisters pass her intellectually and athletically, Rosemary's frustrations gave way to fits of rage. It was hard for her to live at home with the family.
Her parents loved and wanted to help their oldest daughter. But in 1930s America, there was little if any distinction made between "mentally challenged" and "mentally ill," and Joe and Rose Kennedy were horrified by the options available for Rosemary. From page 56:

Dark, dirty and disease- and rodent-infested, many institutions for the insane and disabled provided little more than shelter and some food. Medical care was spotty; occupational therapy and educational and vocational training was nonexistent. Patients and residents would sometimes spend days and nights caked in their own excrement.