Tonight is Red's first private high-school social skills group. There are protest and objections when I remind him that we will leave at 6 p.m. He is motivated only when I say we will stop for a cheeseburger on the way. This gets him to get up from his computer and into the car.
In the car we start with the negative conversation about how this won't do any good:
"It's not going to help me get a girlfriend."
"No one likes me at school anyway. I mean no one really cares about me."
"So and so is not really my friend anymore. All she does is talk to her stupid boyfriend all the time."
We get off the highway and drive down Anderson Lane through an eclectic Austin neighborhood. "Keep Austin Weird" is the city motto.
"Is this a bad neighborhood?' he asks.
"No...this is just Austin."
We pull into the parking-lot of the coffee house thanks to the trusty navigation app on my phone.
"This can't be it. It's too dark."
There are no lights on the little parking lot and very little light emitting from the venue of tonight's meeting. It's dark and it's cold at around 27 degrees. The wind is blowing fiercely. Red has a tendency to move excruciatingly slow.
"Well...this is it and hurry up because it's freezing out here."
"I hope we don't get shot," he says before we get out of the car. Wow! Really? Shot?
I think he's a little anxious.
"Stay here," he says. "I mean make sure you stay here the whole time."
"Don't worry son. I'll be right out here."
He meets the group. They disappear behind closed curtain to their own private area. I can tell he feels a little out of place.
Afterward:
"How was it?" I ask.
"It was fine."
"Did you like it? Do you want to come back?"
"Yeah."
In the car:
"Can I stay up till like midnight?"
"Of course........not."
"Can you tell me about it? I mean what did you talk about?"
"Social skills."
"What specifically about social skills?"
"I don't know."
Is this going to work?
Will this do him any good?
Will it help him make some friends?
Become more self-aware?
Anything?
I have no idea.
Will we go back?
Will I shell out more money for the possibility?
Definitely.
Did you know you can vote for me daily with just a quick click?
Logging you in...
Adelaide Dupont · 285 weeks ago
And for those of us who knew and appreciated these points in high school to a greater or lesser extent - always good to have a refresher and feel them through the current and future generations who we survived to be able to see.
I especially appreciated points 5, 7 and 10.
And young women not settling or settling down yet is a good thing.
"It's never too late to live our dreams" - but it may be too early for some of them!
And 8 of course.
nicole · 243 weeks ago
Risa · 230 weeks ago
LAH · 221 weeks ago
Maira L. Coral · 216 weeks ago
I was looking for information for my Multi-Genre Disability Research Project from my Early Childhood Special Education class on the web, when suddenly I came across your blog. I started reading this out of curiosity and I want to tell you that as you said yourself, you will not be Amanda Gorman, but you managed to make me shed some tears, perhaps because I felt totally identified with your words, especially in the part that you speak of your son. My son also has Asperger's syndrome, he is 19 years old and he is in the second semester of College. Also like yours, he takes classes from home, likewise my eldest daughter is also taking college classes from her room. At the same time, that I work as a preschool teacher from my kitchen through a computer, my husband sleeps in the room during the day because he works at night. Also in the afternoons I myself take virtual school classes. I am a 51-year-old Latin woman who began to learn the English language as adult, so maybe you find some deficiencies in my writing, however, I was very moved by how proud you express yourself about your son. Referent your mother, I liked the humorous tone that you give when your talk about her, so I did not want to miss this opportunity and stopped my assignments for a moment to let you know that your words do make a difference, since they reach the heart of at least those who have opportunity to read you. I want confess you that is the most long I have written to someone I don't know, because your words inspired me, thank you...
Gavin Bollard · 209 weeks ago
Thanks for this post. I've been very distracted of late and so this was how I found out about our friend Kate. Kate's struggles were very real but they were so constant and so wide-ranging that it was difficult for people around her to address them. I think it's going to take a while longer for me to process all this.
I learned so much from Kate because she was always quick to point out the many injustices in the world. In her glory days, she was very much a crusader and she cared for everyone. Over the years, as her situation took its toll, I came to realise that it was the fact that she couldn't be put in a single specific category, that made the system fail her. She needed help that they weren't set up to provide.
She needed more care and she needed to be less alone. I'm so sorry that this has happened.
For a long while we were corresponding almost every day but a couple of months ago, I realised that she had become so stressed that nearly every interaction I had with her was starting to trigger her. I backed away to give her a bit more space. She only had a little time that she could stand to be online and there were too many things that she wanted to do in that time. I thought that by taking a step back, she could reach out to more people who might be geographically closer and able to assist.
Kate was a beautiful soul and she will be sorely missed by all of us.
diyalabs6192603 11p · 192 weeks ago
Robots for kids
Robotic Online Classes
Robotics School Projects
Programming Courses Malaysia
Coding courses
Coding Academy
coding robots for kids
Coding classes for kids
Coding For Kids
Spoil your cat · 122 weeks ago
Many of these living arrangement aren't good, and many of the people who run those places really don't have the residents' best interest at heart. Those places are like old age homes and foster homes, where you sometimes hear horror stories. They're hard to trust. But then there are good ones, of course.
The best thing for an autistic adult is either to go on living at home or working and renting an apartment and living independently, but that isn't always an option.
Duncan · 112 weeks ago