Its been said “what doesn’t kill, us makes us stronger”. I’m not sure if I necessarily believe that’s true but I do believe that, most of the time, the times we wish it would kill us takes us to a new level of understanding. That has been my journey with autism.
I’ve heard it compared with planning a trip to one place and finding yourself in a very different destination upon arrival. I guess that’s kind of true but most of life really doesn’t turn out the way we had expected it would does it? There is also a great deal of debate about whether or not the puzzle piece is the best representation for the cause. Some people are very offended by the idea that their child “is a puzzle”. Quite frankly, I’ve never one who isn’t a puzzle at one time or another. (I suggested they make it a bottle of anti-depressants for the parent’s sake but not everyone believes in “better living through pharmaceuticals” I guess.)
For me, autism has just refined me into a better version of me. Please don’t misunderstand me - it hasn’t always (and isn’t still) an easy path. Most of the time we are a – track with me here – a Public Spectacle. We wear earmuffs in July into restaurants that are too noisy and laugh at COMPLETELY in appropriate things. But despite all the bizarre ways we are different, I am finding a peaceful coexistence with autism. As a matter of fact, I think we are better off for it.
My son has given me insight and perspective into so many facets of life that I wish I’d started writing them all down years ago, but I was too busy reading textbooks about how to get him to make eye contact and speak. But not many days go by that God doesn’t bring something to mind that says: Ya’ll are marked for a different, wonderful existence that, in it’s own peculiar way, will point to me. So I thought Theology Barbie could put some of her more specialized skills into practice and exegete our experience once in a while.
Most recently, I wrote about Noah’s Batman Theology (see April 1, 2010) as he theorized that Jesus came to save the super villains too because “Jesus loves them more than they are bad”. Yes sir he does, and praise God none of us are getting what we really deserve. My little peacemaker plays with the villains as much as he does with the heroes because he sees their redemption, where I cannot. I wish I could do that. Jesus did. Tax collectors and zealots, Roman soldiers and Pharisees, women of “ill repute” and thieves on crosses all had redemptive qualities in the eyes of Jesus. So when Noah made a WANTED poster for Mr. Penguin, it was simply because he thought Jesus would have wanted him.
Maybe Noah remembers what it was like to be cast to the side and unwanted himself. I know what it’s like to be the parent of the child everyone had hoped was staying home that day. (Hey, I was a teacher too so I’m not judging anyone here.) I remember seeing it in their eyes as I dropped him off a little late (because we’d has to wrestle socks onto his feet amid shrieks of torture). Their mouth said, “Noah is here!” but their eyes said, “Excedrin – now!”
When Noah was between 2 and 4 years of age, you really had to look hard for those charming redemptive qualities you find in “normal” kids. Almost completely mute, and most definitely unintelligible, communication was difficult on it’s best day. Coupled with lack of eye contact and a serious aversion to touch and other human beings in general, Noah was a real charmer. But baby sitters loved him because in his own environs he was quiet and easy. I found myself saying, “Noah pretty much just does his own thing” quite a bit. I know part of it can be attributed to neurological processes that were occurring in his brain at the time, but I also wonder if Noah just instinctively knew on some level that we weren’t ready for him. Whereas I often took his aloofness as rejection, he was merely protecting part of himself that he knew would be misunderstood at the time.
Now call me crazy (trust me, better people than you have done it) but I think about this every time I read Jesus telling someone not to speak of a miracle he had performed. Early in Mark’s account of Jesus, we see him heal a man with leprosy and send him “away at once with a strong warning: see that you don’t tell this to anyone” (1:43). Again in chapter 3, Mark tells of Jesus driving out demons giving them “strict orders not to tell others about him” (v.12). I used to wonder why Jesus would even bother to heal someone if it had to be kept a secret. I mean, seriously, how could you go and present an offering for ceremonial cleansing when everybody knew you had been a leper yesterday and not tell them what happened! But we know that Jesus didn’t want the notoriety and frenzy that he knew would soon follow the truth about who he was. The people were ready for it yet.
They weren’t ready for the concept of “God with us”. It was too much too soon. He needed time to bring about his kingdom slowly and methodically. There was so much he wanted to teach them before he became a public figure, so he often isolated himself and withdrew to “lonely places” (1:45). It would have been too beautiful for them to see all at once.
I’m reminded of the play Our Town by Thornton Wilder. In act 3 Emily, one of the main characters whom we watch grow through adolescence into adulthood, dies during childbirth. The scene takes place at her graveside as Emily begins to converse with the dead around her during her funeral. As they watch, they ruminate on life saying, “I’d forgotten all about that. My, wasn’t life awful- and wonderful”. Emily is given the gift of returning to life for one day and wants to choose a “happy one”, but is advised not to select a special day because it would be too painful. Their words prove true as Emily becomes overwhelmed with emotion watching scenes from her 12th birthday. She realizes how wonderful and complex the little things are when viewed in perspective. She says to one of the dead, “They don’t understand do they?” who replies, “No dear, they don’t understand.”
In the same way I wouldn’t have understood had Noah been able to reveal himself to me all at once. I wouldn’t have been able to grasp all the wonderful ways his neurological diversity would point to God. It would have been too “awful – and wonderful” at the same time. No, I needed to be taught lots of things along the way. I had to take the journey, or acknowledge the puzzle, in order to be prepared for the wonderful Gospel of Autism – where every villain is offered redemption and it’s only normal to be different.
Together, Noah and I have journeyed to some “lonely places” of our own. But much like an X marking a remote spot on a treasure map, we have found something priceless in each place. The Autism Gospel has given much more to my life than it has taken away and I am a better me because of it.
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