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"Autistic and Undiagnosed: My Cautionary Tale" and "Self-Awareness in Living With Asperger Syndrome", by Dave Spicer. Two presentations given in March of l998 at an AS conference in Sweden.
I grew up in Connecticut, where there is a Shakespeare Theater in
Stratford. Twice I went to it in high school, on class trips. One of
the plays I saw was "Macbeth".
Easily the most memorable part of the whole deal was the witches'
scene, because while they were prancing around and cackling, one of
them suddenly screamed and fell off the front of the stage into the
orchestra pit. They made do with two witches for a minute, then the
third one hobbled back onstage from the wings.
This happened more than thirty years ago, but some things kinda stand
out in one's memory. In honor of the event I wrote: --Dave Spicer
Bewitched
by Dave Spicer
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We knew the witch should pitch a fit but then she pitched into the pit so while the cauldron fumed and bubbled the triple witching merely doubled 'till once again with limping grace she dared to show her witchey face upon the stage to strut and fret and dream of rest and liniment. |
Something over twenty years ago, I transferred from the Engineering to
the Data Systems department at the phone company in Connecticut.
Fresh out of training class, I was assigned to one of the work groups.
As a new member, I was given the task of making coffee for the group.
We had a commercial-sized machine, so it wasn't too much trouble.
After a while, I started noticing a plastic pitcher of water next to
the coffeemaker each morning when I came in. It seemed that I had a
helper. I gratefully used this water for each day's first pot of
coffee.
Some time later - days, weeks, I don't remember - I overheard a
conversation in the group. It seems that another new member had the
job of keeping the group's plants watered, and was puzzled that the
pitcher of plant food mix kept disappearing...
Not long after, I no longer had to make coffee.
...and so, again in commemoration:
Good To The Last...
by Dave Spicer
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I tried to make my cohorts green, the healthiest green you ever seen. I wonder if they would have minded growing hair all leafed and vineded losing fast their morning glower bursting out with flower power. (Slaving at machines of Babbage looking just like haunted cabbage, Punching cards of Hollerith while smelling kinda hyacinth.) Lush, abundant women and men getting all their nitrogen While cautious, in this world of evils, never to get et by weevils. If, some day, their bloom should fade and potbound skulls thin hairy glade, not one would be a balding serf - they'd just get "rugs" of Astro-Turf.
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My father was a podiatrist (foot doctor) for 50 years. An old piece
of equipment he had was called a "diathermy machine" - it was the size
of a small suitcase and had several adjustable coils and spark gaps.
It produced RF (radio frequency) waves which were sent through the
desired area of tissue to heat it up. It had laid, unused, in the
basement for a long time. In my early teenage years, I asked my
father if he could "fire it up". He did.
Man, was it impressive... the spark gaps sizzled, the sharp tang of
ozone filled the air, all TV channels were just obliterated... we
didn't leave it on very long.
Diathermy
by Dave Spicer
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When first the ancient switch was thrown we sat in silence there, alone, but then, as air gaps were adjusted (years before folks got Ghostbusted) sparks did leap and dance and sear and scare us halfway to next year. I gotta say, it was dramatic drowning Channel 8 in static - was their program bad or good? Well, no one in *our* neighborhood could tell if it was even there 'cause Pop and me in basement lair were being Scientific Men consuming all the oxygen and making a tremendous fuss 'till Mom came and reminded us that maybe we had done enough, for one day, of nostalgic stuff... And so, the Grand Device was put away once more... in fact, for good... But still within my mind it lives, and tissue-warming pleasure gives, its Last Hurrah when Last Connected gratefully now recollected.
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That Asperger Kid
by Dave Spicer
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He gets upset and runs off screaming - that or sits there fish-eyed, dreaming who knows what from who knows where - so weird, that kid, he sits and stares at nothing. Nothing! Every day the same act. I give up, okay? I mean, we tried to understand him. Couldn't do it. Gotta hand him this - he's good at being strange he damn well better change because we're right. No little pansy any more, he's gonna learn to be a man and take his orders.... Now what? What's the use of trying? Look - he's down there crying on the floor I just can't take this any more. We never know what's going to happen wish he'd shape up, cut the crap and grow up, join the world of men, but whadja expect? he's one of THEM.
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Autistic Identity
by Dave Spicer
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They ask me questions. Carefully, I answer, so deliberate, explaining Once again the sense in why I do things as I do. They show me aspects of "the world" like cheating, violence, lies, deceit, and tell me I must know all this to function in it. Simply put, They cannot see the path I follow. Me, I know it's there - it doesn't seem like home somehow, but nowhere does, and look what their religion says - to "be not of this world but in it". That's about just how it is and how it goes this path that leads a different way that what they'd hoped for. Then they cry - I see the track a tear makes down a face, and wonder why they aren't at peace. The weather's not so bad inside here, really, kind of quiet watching through the window, seeing, hearing, sitting, thinking, contemplating all the noise outside They say "that's how the world is". Fine, but their frustration, living in that world, gives pause to folks like me who feel their pulling hear their pleas receive their training all designed so we can "join them" - do we have to? There?
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A poem on communication (directed to NTs) by Dave Spicer |
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So I'm supposed to think like you in order to relate to you - my words have got to be just right to save your precious mind some work.
Instead of seeing where I am,
But I don't want to live in that place,
So here's the deal: listen to me, |
My Friend by Dave Spicer |
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It started early - people noticed things about his son and passed them on to him with relish... such as
"Gee, he doesn't look quite 'right' " and
Until the weight of all the incidents
...and information, trickling in,
waiting for the phone calls, pages, notes
from school, communications
My friend was slowly drowning. There I found him.
Listen to him? I could do that... And so I did.
The days, still hard, come regularly,
But he is not alone. And, funny, I'm not either now... |
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