Autism: A Story of Becoming

Let me tell you my story. It is unflinching and real.

I sit high above the buildings. The sky is a piercing blue. Below me, cars zig-zag around each other. People hurry down sidewalks, into restaurants and shops. Winter’s sun makes shadows on their faces.

It smells like a city. There are too many parts to separate just one.

I peer through the branches. I see a tall young man carrying a duffel bag. He wheels a red suitcase by its handle.

Behind him, a woman walks quickly. She is trying to catch up to his long strides. Although tall herself, she is no match to his length.  

They are related. Mother and son. You can see it in the shape of their eyes.

He stops when the light turns red. He edges his way into the crosswalk. She reaches out a hand to hold him back. She thinks better of it. At nineteen, he often resists her mothering.

Like a kite in the wind, he longs to fly.

The light changes. Side-by-side, they walk.

A bus stop. He sets his bag down and hops lightly in place. He checks his watch one, two three times. A man on a nearby bench stares.

She squints to the sky. She thinks of sandcastles, of jellybeans, of newborns swaddled in blue blankets.

Long conference tables, team meetings, paperwork with her signature at the bottom.

Everything, it seems has led to this point.

She wears her words on her sleeve, her heart on her shoulder.

When will the staring stop?

When will the hopping stop?

Never. They will never stop.

Every story needs an enemy. An antagonist.

Who is the enemy here?

Autism?

That doesn’t feel quite right.

Perhaps anxiety. The way it loops and binds his soul – tethering him to unnamable fear.

It is one story, but it is everyone’s story. A story of overcoming and becoming.

Her mind becomes a slideshow.

In first grade, his hands clamped over his ears as the driver pulled away.

Picking him up from school in fifth grade because he was too overwhelmed and anxious to ride safely.

And now, at nineteen, taking the Greyhound bus.

Except instead of kindergarten, or first grade, or middle school, he’s going back to a college program.

The bus pulls up to the curb.

He picks up the duffel bag. He grasps the handle of the suitcase.

Standing near the doors, he holds out his phone to show his ticket to the driver.

Again, she stops and starts.

Desperately, she longs to intervene – to nudge the word autism into the bright, cold day. Again, she steps back.

Autism. Stops. Starts. A ride back to a new normal, a new home.

What next?

Where will he go when this program is over?

Who will take care of him when she’s gone?

Too many loose ends, when she longs for knots.

He takes a step. He looks back at her. She waves.

Bye Jack!

Over his shoulder, he calls out five words.

“Mom. I love you.”

She puts her hands in her pocket.

She turns and walks away.

She smiles.

Tears run down her face.

I turn from my perch. Slowly, I stir the air with my wings. Against the sky, I take flight.