Mr. Monk Gets Hypnotized

Have you ever known a person and wondered what they might have been like as a kid? For instance, I've always pictured Mr. Monk as this kid who did eveything by the book and then some. A kid who didn't even WANT to do the things other kids had fun doing. In fact, I've always assumed he must have been the best behaved, albeit unhappy, kid a mother could ask for. Boy, was I wrong!

Mr. Monk underwent hypnotism against my wishes because it seemed to work for his rival Harold Krenshaw. The result was more than I could have ever bargained for. Mr. Monk reverted to a childlike state of mind. At first, I had no idea what was going on. I mean, he was touching nature and doing all kinds of other un-Monk things. At one point he even took a flower and started brushing my face with it! I should have realized right away something was seriously wrong.

Eventually, I managed to figure out that Mr. Monk had gone to see that hypnotist and called Dr. Bell. He said Mr. Monk was acting and thinking as though he were 6 or 7 years old again. Apparently, it might not have been perfect time of life for him, but in his mind it was a happier time in comparison to everything else. I guess this was payback for all of the times I've joked about being Mr. Monk's babysitter. Because let me tell you, he was definitely NOT behaved! Instead of him wanting to play solitaire or stack building blocks in perfectly even structures, he was rambunctious, got into everything, spouted off the first thing that came to his mind, you name it. In short, he was a handful. It made me almost grateful that I'd had a daughter and not a son!

But for all the trouble Mr. Monk caused, I can't say I wasn't pleasantly surprised. It may have been weird to see a grown man acting that way, but at the same time, it was nice to think there must have been a time when Mr. Monk was a happy, normal little boy. Okay, so technically he wasn't actually reliving his childhood according to Dr. Bell. But he WAS reliving the childhood he desperately wanted. So that's enough to mean he wanted to be happy like any other kid. And that thought actually makes me pretty angry at what he went through. How could anyone not have loved him enough to even give him a single pancake? How could his mother or father not have gone out of their way to nurture that happy spirit inside?

I don't claim to fully understand the cicumstances surrounding Mr. Monk's past or what his parents did to put a damper on that happiness or why they did. But now I do know that somewhere inside, a 7 year old boy named Adrian is still as carefree as he's always dreamed of being. I only wish there could be a way for little Adrian to grow up and be the happy man Mr. Monk deserves to be. You know, I have a feeling Trudy was the one who took the time to free that happy spirit until her death sent it back into hiding. But who knows. Maybe someone else will come along and free it again, no hypnotism necessary.

- Natalie Teeger