Unwelcome Dental Advice

Preface: This was written like seven years ago.

Midwest City, OK – An area woman was left beleaguered and confused by a permission slip given to her daughter, who attends Carl Albert High School, this morning. Karen Caldwell, a shoelace eyelet diameter measurer in Midwest City, cursed aloud as her child, Samantha, presented her with a permission slip to go on a field trip to The Cowboy Hall of Fame in Oklahoma City.

“I don’t even… What does any of this even mean?” a flustered Caldwell told reporters. “What the fuck is a plantkin?!”

The new style of permission slip was meant to be an all-inclusive, politically correct way to ask parents to let their children go on field trips or participate in sports. It is the invention of Carl Albert High School principle Martha Brown, who would rather be referred to by her otherkin name: Athawhalpah. Martha typically identifies as a menstruating water buffalo, but sometimes as a kangaroo with palsy, or a tortoise with Tourette’s.

The following is a copy of the permission slip:

I, _______________ (your name), parent/legal guardian/father-and-lover/mother-and-lover/abductor (circle one) of _______________ (student’s name), hereby give my consent and permission for my son/daughter/demison/demidaughter/trans-boy/trans-girl/plantkin/otherkin/polykin/asexual being (circle one) attend your history/herstory/lessons of the past full of cis-male assholes (circle one) class field trip to the Cowboy Hall of Fame/Museum dedicated to privileged cis-ethnic, cis-white, cis-male murderers and outlaws (circle one) to take place on October 7^th.

Please find enclosed $30/Legal tender featuring the faces of long-dead privileged cis-male slave handlers in the amount of “30” (circle one) to pay for entrance and lunch/a “healthy” vegan meal/a “healthy” vegetarian meal/”meat”/a goddamn banquet for the entitled assholes made possible by slaughtering innocent animals, you fucking make me sick (circle one).

I understand that the field trip/reprieve from devil child/possible abduction of my offspring (circle one) is scheduled to last past the normal school day hours and that he/she/he-she/zy/zym/ze/zyr/xie/xe/xim/ve/ver/vis/em/eir/eirs/bun/buns/it (circle all that apply) will not return home/to prison/to Jesus’s arms (circle one) until 5 pm or later.

At press time, a traumatized Karen Caldwell was found rocking back in forth, naked in her running showering, whispering “ze, zer, zem, xie” over and over.