AFTER John Ginan was formally accepted for the Europa Colony Program (ECP) in early 2015, his first order of business was to spend at least three days in a NASA psychiatric facility. That was where he got the "Spoonman" moniker.
NASA's Europa-colony recruiters had suspected he was bipolar psychologically during the "First Wave" colonist-selection process; but his intelligence and physical-endurance assessments had registered at the top of the scales. In addition, stigma over most mental health conditions had not been a barrier to NASA employment for more than a century.
Spoonman stuck as a nickname because of all the ingenious spoon inventions that he created in the Cape Canaveral Behavioral Health Unit (BHU). Like the plastic knives and forks that patients received with their BHU meals, spoons were considered potentially dangerous objects; and patients had to ask for spoons if they wanted to snack between meals.
In general, John Ginan loved to eat sweets; in particular, he adored ice cream. Finding ways to enjoy his favorite dessert without asking for a spoon had fired the flames of his imagination.
First, he discovered no spoon was required at all when raiding the BHU's refrigerator-freezer, which was always stocked with vanilla and chocolate ice cream. The seemingly endless supply of frozen temptations in the freezer box were packaged in small, tub-like paper containers. The soon-to-be-dubbed Spoonman had realized quickly that he could pull off the little containers' lids, then tear off about half of the containers' remaining paper to consume the delicious contents without using a spoon.
Second, this 26th-century man followed in the cheesy footsteps of a 20th-century pop icon -- old fashioned television's Angus McGyver. Spoonman's grandfather, Daniel Ginan, had a favorite joke about McGyver that he would spring on anyone around him whenever necessity became the mother of invention: "McGyver could make a hand grenade out of a potato and a tampon!"
John Ginan discovered several other ways to craft spoons in the BHU:
- He could combine the paper lids from two or three of the little ice cream tubs to make a rudimentary spoon, which was particularly effective if he had the patience to allow the frozen treat to melt a bit.
- He extrapolated from the paper-lid-turned-spoon invention to other forms of utilizing readily available thick paper, including tool-making with manila folders.
- He realized that the index, middle, and ring digits could form an effective spoon -- ideally with a sink nearby to wash his sticky fingers.
They all dutifully honored his request, and the Spoonman sobriquet stuck like glue.
Opening positions in chess /Wikimedia Commons image
Jim Pappel
Unlike Spoonman, who had no awareness of his precarious mental state before he was recruited for the ECP, Jim had known he was bipolar for more than a decade. He just chose to ignore it.
Unlike Spoonman, who grew up in a relatively stable neighborhood in Manhattan, Jim grew up in a low-income housing project in the perennially tough North End of Hartford, Connecticut.
Unlike Spoonman, who could trace his ancestry to the Mayflower Pilgrims and had such a fair complexion that his skin was almost transparent, Jim could trace his ancestry to the slave trade in Nigeria and had such dark skin that he was "out-of-Africa brown" as his grandmother Angela Pappel would often say.
Unlike Spoonman, who had no children, Jim had sired his first son when he was 16.
Spoonman had an itch to play chess from Day 1 of his confinement in the BHU, and he defeated two staff members handily, so his confidence had been transformed to hubris. Jim was game for the challenge on Day 1 of his three-day stay in The Unit.
The pair met over breakfast on Day 2 of Spoonman's BHU stay.
"One of the psychiatric nurses says you have rolled over two pretty good chess playahs on the BHU staff," Jim said, making his first move of the psychological game-within-the-game of chess.
"I am on a roll. If you want to play, why don't you go ahead and take white. I'll give you the first-move advantage," Spoonman replied, brimming with confidence as he gestured with his pancake-laden plastic fork to the chess board and pieces he had set up at an empty table in the nearly empty BHU cafeteria.
"Alright, but don't think you are going to play teacher and preacher on me. You are probably in the BHU because you don't know who you are; and I'm not interested in hearing any lecturing from anybody in this place."
"Sounds like you are bringing your 'A game' to this match, Jimbo!"
Jim quietly moved himself and his breakfast tray to the cafeteria's de facto chess table, then made his second move in the psychological game-within-the-game. "Nobody ever called me Jimbo in the hood. Your move," he said, advancing his queen's pawn two squares.
"It's about time somebody here challenged me for the middle of the board," Spoonman said, matching Jim's opening move by advancing his queen's pawn to block encroachment into his side of the board.
"Didn't you hear me when I said no teaching and no preaching? Are you going to play this game, or are you just gonna to talk about it?" Jim said in a serious tone as he advanced one of his knights to bring more force to bear in the center of the battlefield. "I'll say this: I don't care whether I win this match or not. I'm playing this game to figure out how you play, so I can definitely beat you in the next game!"
"Maybe I should start focusing on my A game," Spoonman replied, pushing his king's pawn forward one square to help brace his shiny black pieces against the growing potential of a bloody onslaught from his apparently skillful opponent.
"You're not listening. You're talking. I'm not bringing my best 'game' to this match. I already told you what I'm doing, and I'll tell you again. This round is all about figuring you out -- discovering how you play the game."
Jim's harsh rhetoric took hold on Spoonman as he pondered his next move. "Alright, alright, I'll focus on the game. Why don't you tell me where you're from?"
"I thought you wanted to focus on the game; but if you really want to know where I grew up, I was born in New London, Connecticut, and grew up in Venice, South Carolina.
Spoonman fell silent, realizing that he had probably lost the game-within-the-game and that he was at least one move behind in the mounting struggle to control the center of the playing field. The next hour of the match was fought hard, move-by-move, with barely a word said.
After the inevitable blood-letting in the center of the board, Spoonman conceded, "I'm not going to win this game, but I can play you to a stalemate."
"That's the first nearly intelligent thing you've said since we sat down to play," Jim said, pressing his advantage in the game-within-the-game.
"We're playing for a stalemate now," Spoonman replied.
"No, I can still win. You're playing for a stalemate. You really don't have a clue of who you are, or why you are here in the BHU, do you?"
Spoonman managed to fight Jim to a stalemate, but the effort was exhausting and emotionally raw. "I get it now," he said to his more-than-worthy chess adversary. "You were my teacher and my preacher."
"No, you don't get it at all," Jim said flatly. "This match wasn't about teaching, or preaching, or even chess. It was about your overblown ego and cocky attitude."
"I learned at least one thing, Jim: Over confidence can get me killed."
The next day, which was slated to be Spoonman's last in the BHU, he requested to spend one more day in The Unit.
On Day 1, all Spoonman wanted to do was get out of the BHU, but he had come to appreciate the group therapy sessions and coping skills he was learning. Additionally, the Day 2 care-team meeting after his humbling chess encounter with Jim had been an Earth-shattering eye-opener: He was diagnosed with bipolar disorder.
The diagnosis spurred both shock and relief in the blond-haired, blue-eyed wonder man.
The revelation that he had been bipolar for more than a decade was shocking.
When his NASA psychiatrist, Dr. Zeppelbaum, announced the diagnosis during his daily care-team meeting, Spoonman felt like he had looked up and saw a piano dangling in mid-air above his head. How, he asked himself in that moment, had such a dangerous condition develop without his considerably capable intellect being aware of it?
The relief associated with discovering his bipolar disorder was equally heavy with gravity: Much of his struggles and triumphs as a young man now made sense.
In terms of size and mass, Jupiter dwarfs all of its moon, including Europa. /NASA image
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