Happy Thanksgiving!

Quinn has a new guru. It is Grumpy Cat. If you're familiar with Quinn's work, this totally makes sense.

I tell you this because when Quinn thought he had to make a sign to carry at his school's Turkey Trot activity, he wanted to incorporate Grumpy Cat. Because what says happy thanksgiving, like a cat in a terrible mood? More on this later.

The Turkey Trot was supposed to be a mile-long walk through the neighborhood around the school with parents invited to join in, followed by hot chocolate. Unfortunately the weather today was a heavy mix of rain and snow and hail, so instead of cruising through the neighborhood, the kiddos tried to run as many of the 24.1 laps around the gym that makes up a mile.

Perhaps because of the venue change, I was the only parent from Quinn's class who showed up to watch the kiddos run, walk, skip, dance, and otherwise ambulate around the gym.

I only went because Quinn was expecting me and I wasn't about to change the script on him because of the rain. I'm so glad I did. I got to watch him smile and laugh and talk and play with his new good friend in the classroom. I got to see him talk to a kid I've never even heard of before. I got to talk to a lot of teachers and paraeducators who work with Quinn that I hadn't met. I got to see him show his sign to all the staff, who told him how great it was.

I got to see him be happy and comfortable at school. Even knowing that he still struggles there, that means so much to me.

So even though Grumpy Cat might not approve of a happy thanksgiving, I sure do.

May all of you, American celebrators or not, have a wonderful day full of love and joy and smiles. And hopefully cats, grumpy or otherwise.

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Who Thought Trees Were Such a Good Idea Anyway?

Team Stimey spent a chunk of the weekend raking leaves. And by "Team Stimey," I mean Alex, Sam, and I. The other two showed themselves to be far too unmotivated to participate so they escaped this particular fate.

My family operates on a "prove yourself to be incompetent and you no longer have to do the chore" system. It is inefficient.

Team Stimey: Leaf Raking Edition

You may notice that Sam's jazz band hat is also a leaf raking hat.

I bring up the leaf raking for a couple of reasons. First of all, there were some fun things that happened during said leaf raking and I thought I would share them with you. Also, we won our street's leaf raking and I wanted to brag about it.

Our neighbors didn’t know that they were involved in a Leaf Off, but we did and that is what matters.

I don't know why we moved into a house with so many stupid trees in the yard, but we did, and now we are paying the price. So. Many. Leaves.

DROP YOUR STUPID LEAVES ALREADY, TREE!

I'm looking forward to all of the tracking in of leaves once that tree up there finally drops its leaves right next to our back door in, you know, December. Or January. ENOUGH ALREADY, TREE. WHY ARE YOU HOLDING ON SO HARD?

I tried to avoid leaf raking and hang inside with Quinn and Jack, but Alex used his patented mix of guilt, exasperation, and annoyance to get me outside with a rake in my hands. He then spent a lot of time telling me about how his way to rake and transport leaves was correct and mine was not and, "Let's just do it right the first time and then we don't have to re-rake up all the leaves." It was très annoying—especially when he was right.

On the plus side, I got to see this awesome visitor to our yard:

I watched one of our cats see this guy the last time he was in our yard. Her little cat eyeballs almost popped out of her head.

I also got to do things like distract Sam and generally be a nuisance while Alex steadfastly did things.

At least he could take comfort in the knowledge that he was doing it right.

At some point—because Alex had to be somewhere, not because we ran out of leaves, we'll never run out of leaves—we made a decision to be done.

Then I shoved Alex in the pile of leaves.

It was HILARIOUS.

Then Sam and Alex got this...look in their eyes and I started running and screaming because I know it is funny to throw people into a pile of leaves, but it is NOT funny to be thrown in a pile of leaves because DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA HOW MANY SPIDERS ARE PROBABLY IN THERE?! so I tried to sprint through the garage door into the house, but they caught me and they didn't listen when I told them, "No. Really. I'm serious about this. I don't want to be thrown into the pile of leaves. I really, really don't," but this came out sounding more like a high-pitched screech that turned out to be surprisingly ineffectual.

And then they threw me in a pile of leaves.

I’m pretty sure the spiders laid their eggs in my hair.

Now we're looking into a tree slaughter, under the assumption that if we cut down all of our trees, we won't have to rake any leaves next year.*

* Kidding. But wouldn't that have its charms?

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Hats and Cats

I bought Sam a hat this weekend for him to wear at jazz band concerts.

Then I realized that the thing where people start to look like their cats was happening.

And I laughed and laughed and laughed.

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In Defense of Jerry Seinfeld

I should start by saying that I have been scripting Seinfeld the TV show for years. If you're talking to me and I bust out with some non sequitur that is only semi-appropriate to the situation, odds are that Jerry Seinfeld said it first.

So I was interested when I first saw news reports about Jerry Seinfeld saying he thinks he might be on the spectrum. And then I felt happy. And then I checked social media and I saw lots of anger at him. And then I felt kinda sad and I couldn't stop thinking about it.

Here's the thing: I don't know Jerry Seinfeld. I don't know his private life. I don't know how he came to the conclusion that he is autistic. And what's probably most important, I don't know his inner life—what goes on inside his own head. None of us do, so I don't think we are qualified to weigh in on whether he is autistic or not.

Here's something else: It is very scary as an adult to come out as autistic. It is very scary as an adult who has "passed" for your whole life to come out as autistic. It is hard to tell people who might not believe you that you are autistic. I am absolutely positive that people have doubted my diagnosis, have said that I'm not autistic or not autistic enough.

I am not willing to do that to another person.

I will follow that up with the comment that I absolutely respect self-diagnosis and assert that there are many, many reasons that adults self-diagnose instead of seeking a professional opinion.

I also think it is hard to learn to own your autism when you come to it as an adult. There is a whole set of stigmas and hardships and abuses and discrimination that people who are diagnosed and out as young people have to deal with that I did not. I don't have that experience. What I have is the very nervewracking experience of growing up different and eventually finding a name for it and finding the courage to take that label for myself.

Still, it is hard to take that label, especially when you have been trying to live as a neurotypical person. So I don't take much offense to Seinfeld's use of "on a drawn-out spectrum." When I first started suspecting I was autistic, my statements were very tempered, "I have autistic traits..." and the like. It is too scary to just come out and say "I am autistic," so it's easier to make these softer statements like, "On a drawn-out spectrum..."

I do know that I identify with some aspects of his personality. I think about his comedy and his observational style of humor and about how so much of it is finding the absurd in the conventions of daily life.

I use humor. It is one of the most important things to me. I find life hilarious. I also use comedy as a shield. I use it as a defense mechanism. I use it to amuse myself when I find the typical world strange. I created an entire persona (hey there, Stimey!) that allows me to get out of the house and interact with the world without falling back into crushing depression or incapacitating anxiety. (Also medication. Meds help too.)

Furthermore, I have been closely observing people all of my life, from the gestures they use and the words they say to figuring out social conventions and how I'm supposed to react to things. I remember watching a scary movie as a young person and checking to see if people screamed words or just sounds so I would know what to do if I was ever attacked (by an alien). I remember watching people when I was in college and deciding that I should make eye contact because that's what other people did, so I started doing it all the time. These are just a couple of examples.

I am not attributing my own feelings and past to Jerry Seinfeld. I'm just saying that when I think about what he said, it makes sense to me. Plus he hangs out with Larry David, and I'm sure those two have to have had conversations about autism, because have you ever listened to Larry David?

I do know that if I had come out as autistic and been attacked the way he has been, it would have broken me. I don't know what is going on in his brain and I'm not going to judge. I hope he will choose to speak more about it and I hope it will help all of us in the autism community. Jerry Seinfeld has a huge public platform. I hope he uses it well.

That said, I also hope he finds identity and knowledge and acceptance just for himself, however he chooses to identify. Because that is what most of us want. Welcome, Jerry. I'm happy to have you in my community.

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