Blog # 3 (Black Swan Green, Chapter 2)

This chapter says a lot of good o'l Jason and the problem that he faces internally. The chapter addresses Jason's personal life and some personal problems and how it all started. He by all means is a decent kid who hasn't really done much bad things( aside from breaking his fathers "golden rule") , he does however face a stammering problem for about five years. He hasn't fixed this problem and needed help. It all starts with Jason being driven to a clinic to check up on his stammering problem(it isn't specified that he has a stammering problem YET) and his mother brings up a topic if he has received any valentine cards. Jason says no, but he got one saying "Suck My D#*k" which he didn't feel needed mentioning. He proceeds to mention other students receiving four or seven valentine cards, and Nick Yew getting twenty(shocker...). Jason then proceeds to walk towards the clinic after his mother drops him off near it. Jason is recognized, so the receptionist tells Jason that he could have a seat and buzzes for Mrs. de Roo. Jason is thinking to himself and explains the difference between stammering and stuttering which he says are, "as different as diarrhea and constipation". Jason then proceeds to tell a story from his past about playing Hangman where his stammering came to play. He apparently raised his hand to say Nightale but couldn't manage to pronounce the word and ended up saying that he wasn't sure. He hated himself for not being able to say a simple word in his own language. After that his teacher phones him mother that he had a problem and later he was taken to see Mrs. de Roo, a speech therapist at Malvern Link Clinic(This was FIVE years ago). Jason cannot pronounce words that begin with N since it is a letter that he cannot say without stammering and hangman likes starting with the letter N. He also recalls other words that hangman usually begins with. Jason says that his biggest fear apart from Russia starting a nuclear war is Hangman starting to use the letter J more frequently since he won't even be able to say his own name without stammering. Jason says that tomorrow is when he will have to read from a book called "Plain Prayers for a Complicated World" and it is sure to have many stammer-words and he can't change them up since they are printed on the book. He is worried that he will stammer and after the first break his life won't be worth living due to his secret being exposed. Jason then goes on to tell a story about a kid who had massive pressure on him from his parents and at the  end, he snapped and ended up injuring his eyes(lets not get into that...). Jason says he'd rather kill Hangman than let it take him out tomorrow morning which implies that he doesn't want to go through what happened to him five years ago again and he will do whatever he can to avoid it. He then goes into Mrs. de Roo's office, but before that he looks at a girl the same age as Julia(his sister) and notices that she is on a wheelchair and one of her legs were missing  and thinks that she would love to have Jason's stammering if she could get her leg back. Jason is very self conscious about his stammering problem because he feels that after tomorrow morning people will look at life and say,"well, my life may be a swamp of $#!% but at least I'm not in Jason taylor's shoes. At least I can talk.I feel bad for this kid. he then talks about his speech therapist's office and a bit about her past and where she came from. I don't care much about that. He does open up to his speech therapist and tell her about his assembly that will take place tomorrow. They go over things and his speech therapist says that her goal is to make him look like he doesn't stammer but he still has his stammering problem if that makes sense. Jason got it... you should too(she wants to cover him secret up in a way).She wants him to find a way to make sure his stammering doesn't flare up. Jason is then eating dinner with his family and his father brings up something and Julia questions him. JAson says to himself that he can't even be part of arguments because the moment he stammers, he lost. He then goes to his room after he does the dishes to do some homework. He over hears his sister say to her dad that she would call a friend for homework(their phone was in a hallway which makes things awkward), where in reality she is calling her boyfriend( is later specified) and almost gets caught. Jason eavesdropped on the conversations and gets caught, his sister didn't get caught talking to her boyfriend by pretending to speak with her friend last second. Jason thinks of future events where stammering will ruin his career choices. He gets told by his sister who caught him that a little privacy wouldn't hurt and goes into his room and when he goes to hide something she says "so you agree" and i also learned when Jason is about to stammer he says that Hangman prevented him from saying this or that. He then wakes up the following morning very anxious and talks about how nervous he was and how slow time is going for him. Jason was waiting for the bus in the rain and he can't use umbrellas since they are "gay".When he gets on the bus he notices that the driver is Norman bates who is as tough as nails since he even forcefully kicked out Pluto Noak (some cool kid) and he didn't even care. when he gets to class he is excused from his teacher to do the reading since his speech therapist calling in that he would stammer and it wouldn't be any good for Jason. His stupid classmate asks if Jason would go up and read and all eyes went Jason's way. He manages to get away though and in math class when he is picked to answer eleven times nine, he couldn't say ninety-nine since it was a double-N word which was sure to make him stammer and he says i don't know. He says one hundred and one but his teacher ends the chapter by asking him questions.(Hang in there Jason my boy!) Like i said at the beginning, we learn a lot about Jason's character and his personal problem.