I’m a slow learner, but a good learner, and I am still learning from what I see on the television. The Judge Judy program is a mother lode of insights on human behavior, what is reality, and how we perceive it.

After watching Judge Judy on television every weekday evening for several months, I found that I had progressed through the several stages of, first initial criticism, then surprised shock, despair, introspection, renewal, glee and a clarity of final understanding of how humans behold, remember, reconstruct and hold forth on their version of reality.

In general, it isn’t what it is, it’s what they think it is, and there’s usually a good reason for them to think so, which they are usually in a great hurry to tell you all about, if you have the time to listen. And it’s usually wrong.

The initial stage (criticism) is that they have trouble speaking clearly, and expressing themselves. Later on you begin to suspect (surprised shock) that they think if they mumble, you will take pity on them and find in their favor. The third stage (despair) comes when you realize that not only can they not think clearly, nor express themselves, they probably don’t even really know what happened, or why. The fourth stage (introspection) brings the realization that it doesn’t really matter whether they are nincompoops, or just feigning nincompoopivity. The fifth stage (renewal) comes when there finally appears someone who is actually acutely aware of the reality under discussion, and is neither trying to deceive himself, nor anyone else. Thus, the sixth stage (glee) is when we realize we have found a human being who is trying to be honest with himself, and everyone else.

And the final understanding is that most of us are on a hustle, whether we realize it or not, and we really do want reality to be what we think it is.

It appears that reality, for many people is not reality at all, but just a reference point, about which they weave and spin their own version of what is what, and what happened to them and others, and who happened to be standing too close at the time. There seems to be a certain give and take if asked a specific question.

When asked what happened, they tend to explain why it happened, and if asked why it happened, they insist on saying, in their own opinion, what really happened. And so, it’s mostly a matter of asking why to get the what, and then asking the what to get the why, and there is usually a complicated story attached to whichever one comes last, that explains why it was not their fault but his fault, you know, George’s fault. Blink, blink, smile, smile. Poor me.

You may say I’m projecting my own confusion and misunderstanding upon the whole human race, but I’m glad you had the patience to hear me out. Some say I’m kinder to cats and dogs than I am to people, but I don’t know. I’m pretty soft on cats and dogs.

Orrin Frink is a Kennebunkport resident. He can be reached at ofrink@gmail.com.

Comments are not available on this story.