Free Stupid and Contagious by Caprice Crane

seven before he pipes up again. Ten .
    . . nine . . .
    “She got a nice rack?”
    “Zach!”
    “Rhymes with rack,” he says, looking off and pondering this as though he’s just chanced upon Newton’s First Law of Motion. (For those who need a refresher, Newton’s First Law is: Objects in motion stay in motion. And objects at rest, like Zach, stay at rest. Come to think of it, Zack would never ponder Newton’s Laws. So to that end, Zach looks as if he’s contemplating building a chair out of Cap’n Crunch, and whether he’d actual y be able to sit in it.) “Never thought about that. Coincidence?”
    “Yes, unless you’re planning on growing some man-breasts.”
    “Please. With breasts I’d be unstoppable. It almost wouldn’t be fair.”

    Heaven
    I’m not crazy. I’ve been to a therapist, a psychiatrist, and a shaman healer, and al three have confirmed I’m not. The shaman was at the suggestion of my friend Zoë. She told me this woman would cleanse my aura and cut the imaginary strings that were attaching me to my negativity. I lay faceup on this massage table and watched her actual y miming a pair of scissors as she cut the imaginary strings. I wished I paid her in imaginary money.
    I visited the shrinks on occasion; at times I thought that I might have, in fact, been crazy. But each time I went they told me I’m not. The thing is . . . I have this book cal ed DSM-I I-R. It’s a quick reference guide to diagnostic criteria from the American Psychiatric Association. I got it at a flea market from a guy who looked like he’d stepped directly from its pages. I think they’re up to DSM-IV by now. So mine’s outdated, though I doubt it’s changed al that much. In it are diagnoses for every possible mental il ness out there. The problem is, sometimes the descriptions are so vague you can convince yourself you have every mania known to mankind.
    For example:

307.52 Pica
    A. Repeated eating of a non-nutritive substance for at least one month.
    B. Does not meet the criteria for either autistic disorder, schizophrenia, or Kleine-Levin syndrome.
    When I read that it sent me into a tizzy. I have definitely been known to repeatedly eat non-nutritive substances. It’s what I do. I find something I like and eat it. A lot. It becomes my phase. For a while, I was in my pretzel phase. Then it was muffins. Then peanut-butter frozen yogurt. There was a pickles and coleslaw phase. No, I wasn’t pregnant, and it had to be that kind of slaw with caraway seeds. I’d search high and low for it. Only the best delicatessens have it, but when it’s good . . . it is good. Right now I’m in an oatmeal phase. Odd, considering I’m a carb-conscious eater. But I eat oatmeal every morning without fail.
    My phases usual y last a month. Sometimes six months or even years. But when I stop, I stop. And rarely do I go back to it. So you can imagine my fear after reading the diagnostic criteria for pica.
    That time I read the diagnosis for pica I made an appointment with a psychiatrist. After an hour of tel ing her my fears of pica and possibly worse, she informed me that while pretzels and coleslaw aren’t the most nutritious foods, people who suffer from pica eat non-food items altogether. When they say non-nutritive substance they mean:
    Chalk
    Kleenex
    Xerox paper
    Etc.
    Anyway, you can imagine my relief. But then she hands me this bil for a hundred fifty bucks! I almost told her to eat it. But then if she actual y did, she’d be the one with pica, and her diagnosis of my sanity would count for nothing.
    The other times I happened upon mental il nesses with descriptions I might fit, the psychiatrists assured me that I was sane as wel . Apparently, my handy quick reference guide to mental health omitted the details that prove it. So I am not crazy. And the only common problem that each of them found was that I had no business reading a psychiatric diagnostic book.
    However, certain things do make me crazy: 1. People who are