The year was 1979, my final year of college. Three of us had been accepted into an internship program with an institute for the psychologically impaired. We were given a tour on our first day, after which we were to choose which area we would work in. One building housed beings so physically deformed that they appeared more alien than human. Another building housed the criminally insane. Before entering we were subjected to detailed instructions regarding acceptable behavior on our part, like don’t go into the bathroom, don’t turn your back to them, don’t …

We all chose to work with the mainstream population. Their difficulties were primarily emotional, though they did have the ability to act with some degree of social propriety. As a student of psychology, I expected to spend my time working closely with the residents. This turned out to be an unrealistic use of my abilities. The people who took care of the residents had no formal education. Their only job requirement was 10 hours of behavior modification training.

The psychologists spent most of their time in another building, separate from the inhabitants. They showed up when a resident was acting inappropriately, when there was an emergency, or when they were carrying out a research project. It was a requirement of this internship that we devise and execute our own research project, something that would merit publication in a noteworthy professional journal.

Every proposal I submitted was unceremoniously rejected. It turned out that I was a dreamer, attempting to exist outside of the bounds of normal society. My desires to interact with the residents on some personal level, to form a relationship and watch them grow in some humanistic manner was completely unrealistic. The bottom line, if it couldn’t be measured, it wasn’t real.

Having given up on me, the psychologist in charge recommended that I teach a few residents how to take care of a house plant. So that became my research project. Five residents were selected, five plants were procured, and the study measured each residents ability to care for their plant. Caring was specifically defined as watering. The results would be deemed successful as long as the plant did not die.

Each day I would gather my subjects together, the psychologist would unlock the storeroom where the plants were kept, and each resident would enter the room, one-by-one, to stick their finger into the dirt within the pot to determine if the plant needed watering, which it always did, and then pour some water into the pot. The results were positive. None of the plants died.

My experiences during this internship, of which this was only one, turned me off from psychology as a career. I couldn’t imagine working in a field so devoid of humanity and heart. How could I possibly expect these residents to form any bond with a plant, to ‘care’ for it, when they had no proximity to it? There was no possibility for them to form a relationship with another living thing when it was locked away in a storeroom, out of sight and out of mind. This discrepancy was of no concern to the professionals in charge.

I can’t help but see the similarities between that trivial research project and our modern-day electoral process. Every few years the storeroom door is unlocked allowing us to enter, one-by-one, to nourish our chosen party. Whichever one, democrat or republican, gets watered most basks in the light, leaving the loser to wither in the darkness. And then the storeroom door is closed and locked, while we hope that our choice bears fruit that will return nourishment to us.

Are we all dreamers in the political arena? Are we hoping for miracles, expecting our leaders to relate to us in some personal and truly human manner? Are they capable of relationship? Have they demonstrated the ability to work together for the common good of the people they represent? How can blame be laid upon one leader, when all of those speaking are chosen leaders themselves? Where have they lead us thus far? And when will we hold them accountable? On the day the storeroom door is unlocked?

I remember having arguments with the psychologists. They were behaviorists, believing in an orderly world where everything we did and said was merely a response to an external stimuli. To them, love did not exist. It was merely a learned reaction to pleasing behaviors experienced in our youth. We had an emotional response that felt good and we spent our adult life seeking those familiar feelings, calling it love and friendship. Relationship was a meaningless word in their reality.

Maybe politicians are just closet behaviorists. They offer a stimulus to which we respond, falling into line behind them so they can lead us. And where are they taking us? It appears to be a cold and barren region, a place where relationship is a dirty word.