My baby. Artist graduates. From eighth grade. Next week.

I am so grateful to all his teachers helping me like a surgeon guiding a procedure by phone, offering ideas that unlocked his willingness and at times eagerness to study.

Here at his home school, we have finally learned how to make a fire and keep it lit.

His golf swing is also improving, at the cost of a light bulb or two:):):)

He made it over the finish line.  We love you and are all so very proud of you!

Congratulations, Artist!

members of the club.

Whether children are newly-diagnosed or adult, we have a lifetime membership in the experience of raising a child (or children) that changes us to be tougher than we thought we could be, more patient than we thought we could be, more resilient than we thought we could be, more vulnerable than we thought we could be, more loving than we thought we could be, gives us more heartache and pain than we thought we could stand,

and more moments of joy than we thought we could stand.

And there are moments of joy; at times more than a few.  Especially when we see little breakthroughs, advances, the sights and signs of the growing, green buds stretching towards the light.

And we are growing, too, stretching in our capacity to understand there is a different perfection in our children.  Perfection in the beauty of moments of our day, and in quiet moments of clarity that connect the dots and teach us even if we don’t understand, we can accept.

When things stop, even for a moment, there’s a breathing space where we see that there is perfection and a purpose for everything in our lives.

I am coming to understand the teaching comes in being fully present with the moment I am in right now. With the IEP meetings, school, diet and movement towards independence,  I can stay calm in the underlying energies at play when I can be present with a whole heart.

I am a lifetime member of this club–with benefits.  And life is precious for what I am learning about the real value of membership.

we both brought our cameras

and photographed animals

feathered or furred,

or made of stone, wood laminate

or artistically trimmed topiary–

and our personal favorite, the vintage merry-go-round.

I loved field trips here when I was a child.  I am happy the zoo and other cultural institutions are making the type of accommodations necessary so more families can enjoy the simple pleasure of taking their children on an field trip to the zoo.

Our favorite after-school activity has been pigeon-watching: especially the pigeons around the Eternal Flame at Daley Plaza.

The sight of street-smart birds warming their feet and feathers mere inches from the open flame never fails to delight and puzzle him, and we are not the only ones; others have wondered what might happen if they misjudged the distance or fell asleep with their backs to the fire.  But no bird caught fire during our visit, and we watched them until they joined the scrabble and scrum for popcorn from someone’s snack.

We caught the bus north and continued on home.  As we passed Lincoln Park, looking out the window, my son pointed and said, “Look at the pigeons.”  And there was a small group of pigeons looking for bugs and grubs in the grass.

Not doing anything particular…they were behaving like regular birds.

But the vibe was completely different.  No circling incessantly to scope and snatch the other bird’s find.  No scrabbling or panic or fighting for food, trying to eat anything that fell to the ground.  And I wondered why there weren’t more birds here in this plenty.

And wondered if there was a lesson in why I suddenly noticed it today.

Both places, park and plaza, less than a mile apart, but millions of light years apart in the quality of life.

Free to go anywhere, and yet returning day after day to the same desperate, hardscrabble place and conditions, while an easier, more natural life existed five minutes in flight away.

Trust in the process takes practice and the occasional bumpy landing.  But teaching experiences abound, and can fly into your life like a small flock of pigeons.

He wrote out the steps of the preparation and the utensils involved, and the techniques of moving the hot ingredients from the stove (still something I will supervise until I see he has it down).

And I couldn’t be happier.

I thought that I had been helping him to talk him through it–but during a blessed respite over spring break, I realized I had co-opted his learning experience.

Sometimes I realize I’m waiting for him to @#$%  it up.

Or expected it.

And sometimes I realize I haven’t expected a different result, even as I tell myself I am looking for ways to help him to be independent.

There’s a dissonance that needed to be addressed…

am I really?

The paradigm of wanting to to have a more transparent spiritual life is that the issues come up RIGHT AWAY.  When everyone around me seems to be battling issues with letting go and growing: independence, boundaries and autonomy, the truth is that these issues are my internal struggles with his move towards independence. Making sure I stay needed..or stay in my role as caretaker so I don’t have to grow.

His path is his to walk.

He might @#$%  it up.

And he also might succeed in a way that is his.

I want to bubblewrap him sometimes against some of the experiences I remember from my own memory.  But I will breathe deep while I watch him taking these steps into his future.

I am grateful and thankful for the chances for learning I encounter every day.  And the teacher.

The first 100 days after a diagnosis remind me of the stages of grief

when receiving other earth-shaking news :

What is done in these 100 days determines how things go.

Some families go into denial, or turn to blaming themselves.

Some grieve,

some collapse,

and some get lit up by a hidden reserve of strength and faith

that guides them into finding the best strategies and the treatment for their children.

It is a natural progression, and things take their own sweet time,

but I would hope that even if people go through the stages above

that in time they eventually they would move into positive action

and deal with love with reality and ‘what is’

as opposed to ‘what it should be’.

Here is an interesting offering from Autism Speaks.

The 100 Day Kit and the Asperger Syndrome and High Functioning Autism Toolkit

for purchase or free download here were created specifically for newly diagnosed families,

to make the best possible use of the 100 days following their child’s diagnosis.

Whatever the diagnosis and results of assessments, know you have help

and that you are not alone.

My guy travelled to his Grandma to spend Christmas with my husband’s family.  He has been pretty psyched about the prospect of seeing the young friends around his age who usually come to these gatherings, and who might also be bringing the latest PSP or Wii games to help make the trauma of full-contact family gatherings more bearable.  And though his scheduled routines get screwed up in a new place and new routine, there is usually someone there who knows how he is, and can get him calmed if he is getting upset by teasing or too much roughhousing.

Though all the kids are really nice (and from what I’ve seen, nice to him), they are young guys, growing up and involved in their peer groups and friendships at their schools.   Bringing those contacts and experiences into the holiday gatherings as well.  Unwittingly or deliberately leading their friends into modern adolescence: violent games, suggestive lyrics, rap videos, drugs, sex.  The code of silence.

The minefield.

I remember the shock and titillation the first time I heard “nasty” song lyrics whispered by a new kid in our neighborhood, whose family was damaged and dysfunctional, who eavesdropped on her older brothers’ world to collect what she could use to keep us interested.  We hooted with laughter, yet guiltily, eagerly hung on every word.   I hadn’t even had my first crush on a boy yet,  but was getting my first lessons about sex mixed with the guilty excitement that accompanied the lesson.   It took some of my childhood.  Some of my innocence.  It became a secret.  And for years I became adept at hiding my secrets from my parents, my family and romantic relationships, and ultimately my real self.

And now that he is thirteen, I am watching for signs of it in my son, too.

I don’t know some aspects of his deeper personality.  The things that might attract him, the flipsides, pitfalls.  What he thinks about, struggles with.  His tendencies to secrecy and poor judgement, the things he wants to know but is too embarassed to ask.

I realize I am trying to assess the risks to find out how much my son watches the guys he thinks/wants/hopes are his friends, and what he will do to join the club, like that poor degraded girl years ago who saw depravity as a way to be liked.

I spent years trying to sweep the minefield ahead of time, trying to anticipate the risk, all the while knowing I can’t anticipate everything he needs.  So I need to see it a different way.

It might not be the minefield I have imagined it to be.  And with what I am learning about the nature of reality, might not even a place of any danger at all.  What would happen if I saw him as being complete and learning how to live in his life?  What would happen if he had more responsibility for his life?   What would happen if I saw his world in a different way–as a good place to live, able to teach him what he needed to learn?

And he could show me that the perception of the minefield are my projections of my own issues on him.  It’s like imagining alligators lurking in the cracks between the stepping stones that becomes a sidewalk again instantly when you choose to play another game.

It sounds good.  Playing.  Beats mine-sweeping any day.

and the look of a new costume for Artist–this time, one we made ourselves.

He likes the idea of Halloween, but in the costume-idea department he’s always wanted to be something simple and uniform-y. A race car driver sufficed for three years, then an army uniform.   And up to now, the costumes were cheap.  I just bought the next size up at half-price and it was fine for us both.  But this year I wanted to get crafty and make something different.  I covered a Burger King type crown with black tissue paper and photos of jewels from a magazine,  draped a beautiful length of blue batik cloth over his shoulder, some costume jewelry and voila—–he was Prince Artist the 2nd.

(he was okay with everything except wearing an earring.)

The prayerful pose was also his–

maybe he was channelling a prince from an enlightened monarchy.

I am so happy that there are signs that he is becoming more flexible and open to trying some new things.

Even though the usual verbal answer is noncommittal, he’s at least giving it a try.

New things, one at a time.  And that’s all that I ask.

Happy Halloween.

The creative black and white family portraits in his slideshow moved me to tears, especially the ones in which I recognized the body language and behavior of my son.  He is usually pretty easygoing about being photographed, but Joe’s work made me want to be more persistent in capturing the beautiful images I see of him that catch the more subtle aspects of his personality and showing some of them as artwork.

Though most everyone wanted to talk photography, I spoke to him as a member of our select club.  In and around what we do for our profession, we have children who can break open our hearts with their way of living.  More and more I am beginning to understand that this opened, receptive state of mind offers some valuable lessons for my life for as well.

Here’s a special gift for all us crazy busy parents: a “spa day”– at your computer.  Let the music or the simple natural sound of the water help you get grounded and focused on what is important in your life–you.

http://www.serenitypathways.com/virtualspajacuzzi.htm

I would also like to send along some relevance from Abraham-Hicks, the author of The Secret:

“The most significant thing for a parent to contribute to anyone is their own Connection and their own stability.  An effective parent is a parent who laughs easily and often, and who doesn’t take things too seriously.”

Take time to enjoy the “here and now” with your children, your family, your life and yourself.