July 4th is Independence Day here in the United States. It is also Israeli Girl's birthday. My husband's relationship with Israeli Girl was his bottom: it was what finally caused him to admit his sexual behavior was out of control, that he was an addict. I began calling her Israeli Girl contemptuously: while not technically a girl, she was only 19 when my 30+ year old husband met her on a business trip abroad and began a several year long relationship with her. I don't feel the same contempt anymore, yet I still cannot quite bring myself to grace her with a name. Somehow, giving her a name gives her some humanness, some power, that I don't yet want her to have.

For years, Israeli Girl was one of the most worrisome splinters in my brain. I remember one year, on July 4th, Mark spent $70 of our money (I was furious when I saw the price) on a single international phone call to her, to say happy birthday. I listened to the entire call, jealously, edgily, because something seemed wrong, suspicious, off. I listened for any hint in his voice of anything beyond friendliness -- some trace of desire, seduction, attraction, deep caring, love -- but I didn't hear them, although I knew the sound of them well. And I settled back into a dissatisfied uneasiness, which persisted, until years later, everything fell apart, and made sense.

After my husband admitted his addiction, admitted that one April day he had finally hit bottom with Israeli Girl, July 4th was tainted. I imagined all of those beautiful fireworks going off to celebrate her birthday. I remembered the phone call, imagined what he must have written to her in those years e-mail messages they exchanged, and I couldn't stand to leave the house. This night four years ago, new in a black place of crushing, disbelieving pain, I cringed at each pop of a distant firework, each whistling rocket, and felt they were searing and exploding inside of me.

The next year, Mark and I were wondering aloud whether or not to go out and try to see fireworks. He was tired, and I was still angry and depressed. We both understood that subtext, although with the kids listening, we simply said to each other, "Should we go?" My son heard us talking and said, with verbal skills newly developed after a year of speech therapy, "I want to watch fireworks!" So, it was decided, and I declared it my Independence Day. I was not going to let a tyrannical past rule my present; I would not let the past cast a shadow that blotted the fireworks from the skies my children saw.

We didn't have a destination that year, we simply drove around until we saw some fireworks and parked the car by the side of the road to watch them. There is a Schoolhouse Rock song my son liked to listen to that contained a line, "Red, white and blue fireworks like diamonds in the sky..." As he gazed up into the sky, my son echoed it back, gasping, "They look like diamonds in the sky!" He was thrilled to see a smiley face in the sky, and to watch the blaze of fireworks that marked the end of the show.

As I was putting him to bed afterwards, I told him that he could go to sleep and dream about trains (which were his obsession at the time). When he said he didn't know what dreams were, I told him they were pictures in your head while you sleep. He looked thoughtful, and said, "We can go to sleep and see fireworks in the sky, and we can see that face and then lots and lots like diamonds in the sky."

See, I worried about Israeli Girl's birthday ruining the fireworks, when in fact, my son's joy, and the magic he saw in the sky, threw a light on that night that no dark memory could blot out. I wouldn't think of missing fireworks after that year.

Last year my daughter was awake and old enough to appreciate the fireworks for the first time. As she walked outside, she saw the moon, which was quite a new and exciting sight to her, since her bedtime was 7 p.m. She asked if the moon could come with us to see the fireworks, and I promised her it would. During our car ride, she looked out the car window, checking to make sure that the moon was following us to the fireworks display. When we arrived, she was thrilled to see the moon, still there, watching. She sat with her mouth open wide through the whole show and was too excited to fall asleep, even so long after her bedtime, on the way home.

She and her brother have been chattering all day about the fireworks, about sitting outside and eating cookies and having the moon there and seeing lots of them explode at the end of the show and waving our flags and singing love songs to our nation, like "America the Beautiful," which gives me goosebumps (truly) every time I hear it. My life may not always be perfect, and my country may not always be perfect, but both of us are free.

Happy Independence Day. Enjoy the fireworks.

The scene: Janie's elementary school.

A first grade girl is throwing a huge, spectacular tantrum. She is alternately thrashing on the ground and trying to kick, hit and even bite her own mother as dozens of well-behaved, polite children walk past.  Passersby are shocked and alarmed by her awful behavior.

That child? Yep. My child.

The scene: Janie's elementary school again.

Two girls at a school auction are bidding on the same children's gardening equipment: a pot, gloves, a spade, a mini rake and two packets of seeds. An ordinarily adorable girl has her face contorted in rage, with tears streaming down her face, screams, "I want it!" The other girl whispers, "Why don't we put our money together and share it?"

The first girl tugs frantically on her mother, shrieking commands at her to bid higher, which she refuses, while the room echoes with sobs and other parents look on in alarm. When the bidding has almost closed and she concedes, tearful and desperate, that she will share.

The second girl picks up and calmly divides the item, while the first girl frowns. "Thanks so much for sharing!" says the second girl, before turning to her mother and saying, "When these flowers grow, I want to give one to everyone in my class."

My child? The one who grew a garden to share.

The scene: A supermarket

After screaming at his mother in the checkout line, a boy yells, "You're terrible!" at a grocery clerk whose line happened to be moving slowly. Onlookers frown and whisper with distaste.

That boy? My son.

The scene: A church ceremony

One boy squirms and cries, slides off the pews, hides under the seats and talks out loud during the ceremony until he has to be taken outside.  Another boy sits quietly in his seat for hours, looking at the program, the hymn book and other reading material. An elderly couple praises the parents of the second child for what a good job they are doing with their son, not only is he quiet, he also loves reading.

My child? The one who is obsessed with words and numbers and spent the whole ceremony focused quietly and intently on the new material.

One by one she drops,
into the paper wrapped can,
dime on dime. Plink. Plink.

"Some kids have cancer,
and it's bad that they are sick.
I want to help them."

Most parents hear it at one time or another.  Some variation on the universal theme of parent awfulness: "I hate you. I wish you were dead. I don't like you.  I'm not going to be your child anymore.  I want a new Mommy/Daddy.  You're the worst parent ever."  These pronouncements are usually inspired by something truly terrible we've done, like forbid our child from diving head first off a playstructure onto concrete.  (Actually, a lot of people married to addicts (for whom the rest of this story may also resonate) hear that kind of thing too, and usually for the same reasons.)  And those words can hurt, even when we know they're just a passing storm of anger and frustration.

But yesterday, when Austen screamed, "I don't love you!" it made me feel, well, loved.

Austen is autistic, and it comforts him when the little details of his world are neatly in place.  One of these details is the need to have all words printed neatly in capital block letters; no lower case letters and no script allowed.  If one of us should write something using any lettering that is offensive to Austen's discriminating eye, he will not rest until he has fixed it for us.  Grocery lists can be found with each item crossed out and correctly rewritten above.  Signatures on birthday cards are blacked out and bear neatly printed versions of the name instead.  If you want to keep a document safe from Austen's pen, you should generally keep it out of his sight.

I've recently been reading over some old journals and letters while doing some 12 Step work, and my daughter Janie has enjoyed having me read to her about what I used to do when I was a child.  Yesterday, I was reading to Janie when (and you can see where this is going, I'm certain) Austen, mistakenly thought to be safely occupied with something else, noticed that (shockingly) I didn't not print every item in my childhood diary in capital block letters.  And this was an outrage.  A crime.  An atrocity.  Austen wanted to fix that journal for me right away.

Of course, the answer to that was no.  No, you cannot cross out every word in my precious junior high diary and rewrite it.  I took the journal and locked it up safely in my room.  At which point Austen told me to please walk away and not look at him.  Nothing to see here. Move along.  He'd just be over here trying to pick the lock.  Just ignore him.

So, being the sharp and totally onto-him mother that I am, rather than walking away, I stopped and said, "Buddy, I really can't let you have that diary.  I wrote it when I was very young and it's the only one I have.  It's a part of who I was and who I am, and it's very special and important to me.  If you cross out the words, you'll be damaging it, and I'll be sad and angry and hurt. I'll feel like you would feel if I wrecked up your electronics collection, which I know is really special and important to you."

And that's when the screaming started.  "No!  You must let me have it!  Promise?  You have to let me destroy it!"

"No, I can't do that, buddy."

"Yes, you can!"

Austen's anger usually comes from anxiety, so I took a guess as to what he might be anxious about and tried to reassure him.  "I love you no matter what.  I know I said I would be angry if you damaged something that is important to me, but I would still love you, always and always."

"Well, I don't love you!" he shouted.

"Do you feel that way because you're angry at me?" I asked, trying to help him label his emotions.

"No," he said, through tears of frustration, "Because I have to destroy your diary, and it will hurt you.  And if I love you, I don't want to hurt you.  But if I don't love you, it's ok.  And I really need to destroy it, because it's WRONG in lower case!  So, I don't love you!"

Oh.  Wow.  I'd really misunderstood and misjudged: the level of his need, the level of his empathy the level of his emotion.  But all I could think right then was that this was the best "I don't love you" I'd ever received.

My daughter Janie ran up to me today, curls bouncing and eyes sparkling, and exclaimed enthusiastically, "Mama, I love you the most of anyone!" Then she thought for a moment and (clearly not wanting to leave her other loved ones out of the picture) tempered that with, "More than anyone outside our family.  I love our family the most!"

"I love you so much too! I love you and Austen and Daddy more than anyone else in the whole world," I replied.

"What about our cat?" asked Janie, "He's part of our family. Don't you love him too?"

"Yes, I love our cat, but not as much as I love you."

"Oh," said Janie, "Do you love your friend JW?"

"Yes, I love JW."

"Do you love her more than the cat?"

"Yes, I love her more than the cat."

"And who else do you love? Do you love your other friends, like Jay and Kelly and other people like that?"

"Yes, I love my other friends too."

"Do you love them more than the cat?"

"Yes, I love them more than the cat."

"Why?!" she asked, clearly shocked at the amount of love that was being directed outside of our immediate household and away from the cat.

"Hm, because the cat is, well, a cat not a person. Cats can't talk to me and have a relationship like people can. So, I don't love cats the same way that I love people."

"Do you love all people better than cats?"

I laughed and thought of a whole slew of people, from the kid who used to shoot spitballs at the back of my head to my high school history teacher to George W. Bush to blog trolls, and said, "No, I definitely love our cat more than some people."

Maybe they'll steal in,
burrow under the covers,
on Sunday morning.

Maybe they'll give me
a handmade card, crayon bright,
delivered with hugs.

Maybe a flower:
bright, crinkly crepe paper or
soft, living petals.

It doesn't matter;
I have my gift already.
Happy Mother's Day!

(Note on comments: I'm a control freak and moderate my comments. I will be offline until the end of the week, so please do leave comments, but be aware that they probably won't post until Friday.)

Image credit: Photo by bricolage.108 on Flickr Licensed under Creative Commons

I was reading some mom websites today- moms of autistic kids... kinda started out with one from one of my commenters and (as usual) one mom blog led to another. As I read about their struggles, I reflected back on the first time my son gave me a hug. I'm not talking about the first time he ever snuggled with me, or the first time he held me (he was always a snuggler when sleepy or nursing). But the first time he purposely threw his little arms around me and gave me a big hug.

I was sitting in church, few years back, thinking how unfair it was. Someone up ahead had just been kissed by their six month old. Kissed. I didn't even know six month olds could kiss. I'd never been kissed my son. Never been hugged by him. I looked at my friend trying to restrain her 16 year old autistic son. Is that what the future holds for me?

As if on cue, my son perked up, wrapped his arms around me and nuzzled into my neck. He was almost two years old. I cried for the rest of the service. And about a year later I would hear "I love you." Even though it was simply a mimicked response it was still sweet music to my ears.

How I cherish the little victories...

My son Austen, like many other autistic individuals, does not like (or understand the purpose of) many of society's little pleasantries. He balks at words like hello, goodbye, please, sorry and thank you; anything that can appear in a conversation as part of a rote pattern rather than a unique communication. This can seem rude, especially when it comes to words like "sorry" and "thank you," which are supposed to convey emotions of regret or gratitude. It seems (at least to the neurotypical world) that if someone doesn't say "thank you," they don't feel thanks. That certainly may be the case at times, but Austen's difficulty in grasping the meaning of these stock phrases has made me realize how often I toss them out because it's what is expected, rather than because my own emotions are in line with the words.

A few days ago, Austen was picking up a bit of ribbon next to where our cat was sitting. The cat took this as an invitation to play, batted at the ribbon and scratched Austen's hand. It was a tiny scratch but Austen cried bitterly for fifteen minutes, stopping occasionally to inspect his finger and breaking into fresh tears each time he saw the thin red line on his finger. I sat next to him stroking his back and waited until he was composed enough to accept a bandaid. As soon as I had him settled, Janie and her friend Valerie came running into the room. Janie had fallen down and scraped the palms of her hands as she tried to catch herself. This was the time for saying neurotypical things like "oh, I'm sorry you hurt yourself" or "can I see your hand, please?" Austen's conversation didn't go that way, of course, but it was just as sincere.

"Let me see!" he said. Janie held out her palms. "Oh, you need two bandaids!  It's bad that you need two. See, I have a bandaid too. Kitty scratched me and I cried and cried. But good that you're not crying so much like I did. And you know what else is good? Valerie doesn't have any bandaids! Good that she didn't get hurt." I realized that all the things society wants to hear were there: "How are you? I'm sorry you got hurt. I empathize.  I'm glad to see you're going to be ok." But there was something else there that we don't usually celebrate: "You and I may be hurt, but let's be grateful that someone else we love is safe and well." In seeing the specific situation rather than tossing out the generic words I might have, Austen saw something that I would have missed: an opportunity for gratitude.

Of course, there are situations in which he does use the expected words (if in unexpected ways), and they're all the more meaningful for their rarity. A few months ago, I caught a stomach virus from Janie. I started to feel ill at the end of the day; Mark was on his way home and both kids were with me. On my way to the bathroom as the first wave of cramps and nausea hit me, I let the kids know that I was feeling sick like Janie had been, but that I was going to be ok and that Daddy would be home soon to help me take care of them. When Austen heard me vomiting, he asked from outside the bathroom door, "Do you have the throw ups, Mama?"

"Yep. I sure do, sweetie," I said.

"Oh, bad that you do," he said, and I heard him walk off. A few moments later, he wedged something into the door frame. It was a card from the board game Sorry!.

He said, "I put a Sorry card there for you, because I'm sorry you have the throw ups."

"Oh, I love that! Thank you so much, Austen." And that thank you, as I think Austen knows, didn't really feel sufficient to express my gratitude.

We have a friend who is pregnant right now, and this has got my son Austen thinking about life, although oddly enough, not how life begins, but rather how it ends. He hasn't really expressed much curiosity at all about how life starts; he has flipped straight to the end of the book and wants to know about death.

"When am I going to die? When are you going to die? How old will I be? What happens to us when we die?" he asks one day as we get ready for his bath.

He's not satisfied with the fact that I can't answer these questions. No one knows when or how we die. Probably we'll be very old when we die. Probably he'll be able to live on his own. I hope. (Will he really be able to take care of himself one day?) But no one knows. I point to his grandparents and say that three of them are still alive and older than his daddy and I are, so we all have a long way to go yet.

I tell him that when we die, our bodies decay and slowly transform. Ashes to ashes. Dust to dust. Our bodies are recycled. We become part of the bacteria and soil and plants and animals. He wants to know what happens to our memories, our thoughts, our souls. I try to tell him that what happens to our spirit, that part of us that makes us ourselves, is the greatest mystery of all. That's what religions and myths try to explain: reincarnation, Heaven, Hell, Nirvana, Valhalla, passage over the river Styx to Hades... But I don't get to any of that before he decides that since the matter that makes him up will come back around, his spirit will too. He's invented reincarnation for himself without knowing the word.

"My body is going to become something else, so I think I will too. But will I remember being me when that happens?"

"I don't know. No one really knows..."

"I think I'm going to be an animal after I die. But if I am will you know me? What if I'm a bug? Would you recognize me if I were a bug? Or would you try to squish me? What if you tried to squish me?"

"I think I would always know you, buddy."

"Yes. I would be the little bug who was following you around. And you would know me."

That thought seemed to satisfy him, and he shifted his focus to squirting water from the mouth of a rubber fish into the eye of a plastic shark instead.

Last night my son Austen and I went out shopping so he could pick out a Christmas gift for his sister Janie. He wavered between two different stuffed toys before settling on one he thought she would like. When we got to the register, he handed it to the clerk and said excitedly, "This is for my sister. It's a Christmas present!" The clerk's response was something along the lines of, "Yeah, kid. Whatever." Austen was too caught up in his delight to notice the response, which only made me feel slightly less like punching the clerk in the nose.

That moment, which seems so small to other people, was so enormous to me. Austen adores his sister, as she does him. He did something thoughtful for her. He got excited about creating a wondrous surprise for her: excited enough to want to pleasantly share this with total strangers, excited enough to gleefully and cheerfully ignore the usual sensory overload of shopping.

I wanted the whole world (starting with the sales clerk) to stand up and shout in wonder at the magical specialness of my son. And at first, I as really upset not to see a band pop out to play us triumphant music as the clerk, in awe of our dazzling wonderfulness, fell down prostrate before us. Until I realized I was being, well, a little crazy. Sure, he didn't get it, the world didn't validate us, but it wasn't about the world. The moment was perfect just as it was. And I still get to carry it with me like a secret smile for the rest of the season and beyond.