Autism Answer: Shoes - an Invention.

 

 

My shoes by a tree

Like a slightly cool tickle on my skin, that's how the early morning breeze felt. Summer's second half in Quebec offers the mornings I missed so deeply when living in Texas. 

 

Wearing a t-shirt and shorts I stood on our driveway, facing out toward the river across the street. I am not a particularly visual person, but it is a wonderful view. I focused on the feeling of my hands wrapped around my mug of coffee. It is a little warm, but more than that it conjures up an image of myself as a woman. In my youth I pictured a woman in nature, sipping coffee and contemplating the world slowly, as the iconic woman. The woman to aim toward becoming. By focusing on my hands, I was that woman. 

 

Next, I stepped my bare feet off of our concrete driveway and slipped them onto the grass of our lawn. 

 

The first thing I felt was the coolness, quickly followed by wet. The dew is delightful and refreshing on my feet. It feels like camping. 

 

The pleasure I take in each sensation is remarkable; you might think I don't do this most mornings. But I do. The pleasure does not fade. 

 

The thoughts that tumble through my mind are rarely brilliant, sensational, or earth shattering. But they are lovely. 

 

Informed by the environment and the sensations, my delight in the feeling of feet on cool wet grass this morning led me to think about shoes as an invention. 

 

As I moved around on the grass, under the maple tree and then away from it, sipping my lukewarm coffee and being that iconic woman, I imagined people ever so long ago moving about in bare feet and knowing no other way. Their feet would have been different from mine, and the sensations would have been different as well. There is something healthy about bare feet. But they also would have gotten deep cuts that lead to infections. They would have been unable to inhabit certain spaces or move as quickly in them. They would have been frostbitten. Their bare feet would have been much stronger than mine, but still bare. As foot coverings were invented they would have been celebrated, I'm guessing, by many. Also, I imagine, they would have been scoffed at. The feeling might have been weird and unyielding, and the disconnect from the earth might have felt unfamiliar and awkward. But the perks of protecting feet are very real. Life saving. And the ability to more easily go where we once struggled to go is always appealing. 

 

And then from simply covering our feet to creating shoes. I imagined two long ago cavemen as I moved from the grass back to the concrete pavers of our driveway where I enjoyed the rough texture and tiny runaway rocks - the grit - under my feet. I imagined these men discussing, with invisible to me communication, the invention of these shoes. 

 

One was adamantly against it. They made us less connected to the earth, they made our feet too soft and sensitive, they made people move into places on the planet not meant for us where we proceeded to beat it into submission, to renovate it for our own purposes. This would not be good, he communicated with grunts and motions and invisible understandings, for the way of life. 

 

His companion was declaring the ridiculousness of resisting progress. Nay, the cruelty of it. These shoes save lives. Not only by protecting feet but also by granting them the ability to move farther, beyond previous limits. Imagine the food they could forage! The food they could hunt! We had not been granted such thick paws or hooves like other animals, but we can make them. Make something better even.

 

As I imagined, I moved around again. Back I went to our lawn, bare feet on wet grass, the grass relieving me of the tiny pebbles that were sticking to the skin of my soles. The morning was beginning to pick up and a few cars passed by. There is a small road, as well as a bike path, between our lawn and the river. I like it. 

 

I sipped my coffee and imagined those cavemen recognizing that they were both right. I moved back under the maple tree to step up onto the wooden bench placed beneath it, granting me a neat feeling of being a little taller (standing on a bench) and also a little hidden (in the leaves of the maple tree). 

 

I imagined them sitting on boulders and wearing traditional caveman garb (I've seen the Flintstones so I know the style of the times.) while continuing to debate the various issues of their topic. Shoes. 

 

My bare feet were planted firmly on the bench, the skin of my legs and arms pleasantly tickled by the breeze, the sound of the leaves dancing in the tree above me, rustling, invited my lips to curl upward as I closed my eyes and tuned in. How I adore that sound! 

 

I imagined these cavemen knowing that shoes were not a bad invention, they did not disagree on that, but they could not agree on what was more important - limiting certain things or forging forcefully forward. 

 

As I stood on that bench in my bare feet, loving the option to walk this way in our grass, I noticed the cars becoming a little more frequent. I tried to sip my coffee and noticed there was no more to sip. I recognized it was time to head indoors and drive my step-daughter to her bus stop. 

 

Whispering a quiet imaginary goodby to my imaginary caveman friends I made my way into our large home with a pool, a solarium, five bathrooms (one ever so fancily outside by the pool), and climbed comfortably with my step-daughter into our 2016 SUV where she paused her tik toks (but did not remove her Bluetooth headphones) in order to chit chat with me while we drove through the light traffic, past a plethora of homes in a variety of sizes and styles, careful not to hit the many squirrels that like to fritter from tree to tree despite any roads between them, to her bus terminus. This I did happily and comfortably. 

 

But guess what?

 

I chose not to wear any shoes. 

 

Hugs, smiles, and love!!!

Tsara Shelton (X.com)

Autism Answer: Communication is Hard But We Can Practice Clarity and Meaning What We Say

 

Pencil poised ready to write

Communication is hard. Verbal, non-verbal, written, performed, painted, or otherwise portrayed. English, French, doesn't matter. It's all hard. 

 

As a writer I used to feel as though I'd failed when something I wrote was misunderstood. Tens of people would understand*, and then one person wouldn't, and I'd feel I'd failed. I hadn't peaked as a communicator yet.

 

 *I was tempted to write "hundreds of people would understand" but let's be honest, I never had hundreds of people reacting openly to my writing. That's okay! It's more manageable this way!

 

How silly of me! Pay attention for any amount of time to the world around us and we see communication is always imperfect, even when done perfectly. Did I think I had some magical power of writing that could transcend all others? <--- no, but I've wished it.

 

All of our readers, listeners, neighbors, family and friends, are engaged in their own interpretations based on experiences, level of understanding or intelligence, specific interests in the moment, mood, prejudices, agendas. We are, they are, the world is. 

 

It is one of the wonderful wonders of attempting to communicate. And it is also one of the hardest parts. 

 

Having four autistic brothers who were impacted by the disorder in varying degrees, I grew up craving some sort of device that would allow me to understand them. And for them to understand me. "I love you, but please stop jumping and screaming and making everyone stare at us," I wanted them to know. "Why do you wrap your lips around hot tailpipes?" I wanted to understand. 

 

The jumping and screaming, the lips on hot tailpipes, there were reasons for those (confession: my mom had to teach me that. I actually thought the reason was "they are autistic" and am forever grateful that my mom insisted we explore further) and there were reasons for them to learn which were okay where and which were terribly dangerous. But, communication is hard. 

 

For absolute certain, though, it is worth practicing. It is worth teaching. It is worth honing. 

 

There is a saying: It isn't enough to write so you will be understood. You have to write so you can't be misunderstood. 

 

It is a lovely idea, but if you gauge your ability and success as a communicator by needing to be entirely and always understood, you will lose. 

 

Debates about the meaning of words and art by the greatest communicators are forever engaging interested minds. Not because the communication was poorly executed but because we all understand different things differently. It is a guaranteed product of this desire we have to connect! 

 

I think, instead, it is worthwhile to communicate with clarity. To practice being clear and meaning what you say. To not adjust the meaning in order to be applauded or appreciated, though we will adjust the methods and style. 

 

There is a Lily Tomlin quote I love: We are all in this alone. 

 

It reminds us we are all here, but we are never able to not be alone in ourselves. At least, that what it communicates to me. Who knows what Lily Tomlin actually meant? 

 

Maybe not even Lily Tomlin! 

 

That's the other thing. We can be clear, we can say what we mean and then change and grow and no longer know what we meant. 

 

But now, in this moment of infinity, as we try to communicate, we can practice being clear and meaning what we say. 

 

And that is what I'm trying to say. 

 

I mean it. 

 

Hugs, smiles, and love!!

Autism Answers with Tsara Shelton (Facebook)

 

Autism Answer: There Is Nothing, Until There Is Something

 

 

There is nothing, until there is something.

When I was about ten I had a best friend named Rayna. We both strongly hoped to become wondrous writers one day. We had similar wants from the writing we imagined one day publishing. We wanted to be recognized as wise; as people who could use words to disturb readers into feeling and thinking differently; as writers who were special, spectacular, and unequaled.

Our reactions to blank sheets of paper, however, were drastically dissimilar. And her reaction, I confess, shocked and almost offended me.

I would stare longingly at the sheets, caress them first with my eyes, then my soul, then my fingertips. I would fall into the nakedness of those sheets, usually white or off white in colour, and I would imagine being someone who could provoke those pages toward brilliance; the one writer who could commune with the truth living within each unique page; craving to be the one author who could unearth it, coax it into the light. It would pain me, that desire. That need. Sometimes, when I was brave, I would find a pretty pen and draw a tiny heart in an upper corner, or a small tangle of vines, as is still my habit. (I am now 50.)

Rayna, by contrast, would take the strongest pen nearest and scribble angrily all over the page. Her passion was clear, her need was tangible, her pleasure mixed with pain was on display. “I have to, it’s mocking me, I have to,” she would be saying. Maybe not those words, but that sentiment. It hurt me to see. I couldn’t understand. Even as she explained, even as she matched the intensity of feeling I had toward the same blank sheets, her action was simply unfathomable to me.

But I wanted to write, and I wanted to understand, and I wanted to be all the characters.

So I tried.

We were best friends for only a year, but I remember our friendship often. I remember her need to scribble strongly, to take over, to take action on the intense feelings, often. I remember the size of my desire, my belief in an immensity waiting to be discovered, my fear of ruining it, often.

I recognize both of us in others, now. I see how we are offered a stimulus (something presenting itself, something happening) and how we reach into the same grab bag of emotions (desire, dread, joy, fear, anger, love, worry) and how we take an action in response.

We so often don’t choose the same reactions, and we so often don’t understand each other, and we so often don’t try or want to.

There is nothing, until there is something.

I think it matters that we pay attention to and reflect on the something we make out of nothing. 

Hugs, smiles, and love!

Autism Answers with Tsara Shelton (Facebook)

Autism Answer: A Piece Of Me Isn't Me

 

A silver hair I found on my jeans: a piece of me

 

I was sweeping and singing and thinking last night when I was overcome with the memory of a feeling. I remembered how I used to feel when I had written something and was waiting for reactions. I remembered how my feelings would react to those reactions. 

 

I remembered feeling as though the reactions to my writing were reactions to me. I remember thinking, how could I not feel this way? My writing is me. I word everything precisely; I compose a rhythm meant to match my meaning; I spend as long as hours on one sentence to be certain it is a true sentence, that it says what I mean as much as a sentence can. 

 

Most of my writing, once published, is literally the process of me stripping my ideas and beliefs naked, peeling each layer intimately and purposely, attempting to share a peek of everything with a reader. Any possible reader. It is vulnerable, and it is me. 

 

Yet now, it occurred to me as I looked around for my dustpan, I react to reactions slightly differently. Even though I still write in that same way, I still compose the words and rhythm in a way meant to expose myself, I no longer feel as though it is me readers are reacting to. It is the writing, the ideas in the writing, the piece itself they are reacting to. 

 

I still care, I still hope it is understood and appreciated, I admit to still hoping it is seen as beautiful or important or intriguing. I hope these things not for me, but for the piece of writing. 

 

Which, I admit, is a piece of me. 

 

But a piece of me isn't me. 

 

I filled the dustpan - it had been on the back of the couch - and threw away the debris (tiny pieces of our day) and the song I was sweeping along to changed. It was time to dance. 

 

As I closed my eyes and sang too loud and encouraged the movement of my body to take me away, to bring me to where dancing brings me, I recognized the similarities between the feelings of freedom and self-expression I have while writing that I also have while dancing. But though the feelings are similar, they are executed differently.

 

My writing is meant to be shared. I want it shared. It is not the same experience for me if it is not intended to be shared, if I don't imagine it being shared. Whether or not there ever is a reader on the other side, I always write with a reader in mind. When I write only for me I am lazy. I don't search for the precise phrasing because searching for the precise phrasing is intense and, well, hard work. If it's for only me I simply think, "I know what I mean," and move on lazily. I need to imagine you in order to do the work that, ultimately, is always worth doing. Even though, admittedly, it's me I know it to be worth it for.

 

My dancing, however, is solitary. It is for me and me alone. I don't mind that others are often there, but their reactions to my dancing, if they choose to have them, are meaningless to me. The music, the movement, it brings me to the universe and brings the universe to me and though others are in the universe my dancing feels alone as a universe. You do not need to understand. I'm not concerned about whether others find it beautiful or important or intriguing. It is all those things for me and that's what it's for. It is a piece of me meant for me. 

 

As the song ended and my voice cracked and my breathing was kicked up a notch, I was happy.

 

I'm glad I'm no longer made so vulnerable by my writing that reactions to it feel like reactions to a raw exposed me.

 

I love that I still write to discover and share these pieces of me, and that I still care about my writing enough to want it seen as beautiful or important or intriguing. 

 

I love that I can dance. Wild. Loud. With no boundaries.

 

I'm happy that I'm able to celebrate and explore these pieces in a home that makes room for all of me. 

 

I hope I am doing the same for everyone in my world. Regardless of what their pieces look like or how strange they may seem to me, I hope I encourage growth, speech, individuality, and uniqueness. 

 

My mom taught us how to do that with my brothers, find a balance between precisely working on ourselves in consideration of others and the freedom of dancing with wild abandon for the sake of ourselves, and I hope I forever remember to do that for anyone around me.

 

I love, so much, that it is done for me. 

 

Hugs, smiles, and love!!!

Autism Answers with Tsara Shelton (Facebook)

Autism Answer: I Don't See What They See

 

 

eye glasses on a glass table, out of focus furniture in the background

The kids all crowded around the game table—

Wait, I say kids and perhaps you imagine young children. The playful energy, adults necessarily nearby watching for mood shifts and play gone too far. You think of little voices, shy little ones, hyper boys ready to push.

But I’m referring to young adults. They are kids to us older adults who either birthed them, or are relatives of those who birthed them. Now that I’ve clarified, you picture similar but different people, right?

There is still the high energy, some are shy, maybe hyper boys pushing each other, but it’s different. Adults are watching in this case as well, but with less likely need to step in, though not none.

Did I mention alcohol?

Ah, maybe shift a bit again. There is alcohol. It’s a birthday celebration for the youngest cousin who is now drinking age.

There are about ten of them. Mostly girls, a few boys, all decked out in swim gear and sporting sun kissed cheeks, sun burnt shoulders here and there. The shy one isn’t overly shy, the boys not any more hyper than the girls. It is sunny, there is a pool near the game table, everyone is getting along, the older adults are fairly relaxed and enjoying the beautiful scene.

It is beautiful.

Should I, I’m honestly asking, describe beautiful people in order to ask you to picture the scene beautifully?

What color skin should they have? What sizes should their bodies be? What disabilities should I include, if any? Sure, you'll want diversity, but to what degree?

I was there and it was beautiful. I could clearly feel that. I enjoyed the range of conversations and energy styles. I loved noticing how some of the cousins reached out to newly introduced friends. How some sons and daughters delighted in a social opportunity of this sort.

It got a little less beautiful, in my opinion, with more alcohol.

But, for several hours, it was all simply beautiful.

Kids and adults alike.

However, I ask in earnest regarding appearances of people because, I confess, I hardly noticed and I cannot accurately describe much of what they looked like.

Yet, at least one of the adults (in our older adult group) said enough things about physical appearances that I couldn’t help wondering, not for the first time, what don’t I see?

Comments wanting to become conversation on weight, skin health, ethnicity, and the like, were confusing me a little, giving me a feeling that I am missing something.

Yes, I do see our outsides. I see weight and color and skin. But it is a part so included in the whole that it’s not often specifically noticed. I am aware of the clues on our outsides that point to how we’re doing on our insides and so I don’t try to not see. Yet, for much of my life I’ve noticed - based on the comments of my peers - I am often not seeing what they are seeing. My mom has pointed it out to me a few times, so I know I’m not wrong. A room full of people can be commenting on how something or someone looks, and I often don’t see what they see. (Please note, I don’t mean only bad stuff. I’m not talking about gossipy comments, although I do mean those as well. I’m referring to simply noticing how people and things look.)

This sometimes feeds a worry of mine, about myself.

A little after the birthday celebration, a celebration where most of us were waltzing around in swimsuits, I was asked if I had felt comfortable, attractive even,  at the gathering.  Ummmm…. I felt hopeful that I was not too boring, wanting to be helpful but not get in the way, curious about these people – many of whom I was meeting for the first time – and their stories. Was I supposed to think, also, about appearance? About looking appropriately, I don’t know, good?

Oh, sure, when I first stepped into the yard wearing my swimsuit, my hair unwashed and sloppily ponytail-ed, I was wishing I’d shaved my legs and bikini line, wished my bathing suit wasn’t the wrong size putting me in the position of having to adjust it more often than I’d like. At one point I was told there was dark under my eyes so I presumed I was looking a little old and tired. But I simply shrugged it off and continually stepped into the group hoping to add something beautiful. A listening ear, a helping hand, an interesting, maybe even funny, story or two.

I didn’t much see what I look like or what others look like.

I have wondered this before. Is being “body positive” more than being comfortable in my body? Am I missing something when I don’t much notice the differences, the variety of beauty? When I don’t see what they see?

And I have wondered often, did I embarrass someone? For lack of understanding, for not knowing what I don’t see, did I embarrass someone?

I know I sometimes do.

“Mom,” my youngest son once said in his usual thoughtful careful manner, “could you please come to my school event, but wear pants that don’t have so many holes in them?”

I don’t pretend to not see at all. I recognize a neat smile, eyes that are unique, an extra long beard. But, as I said, it is all part of a much bigger whole.

Books and covers, I was thinking about before sitting down to write this out. I do notice myself attracted to a book cover based on looks. If it looks like the type of texture that feels good in my hands, if it has colors and images that appeal to me, I notice. I think my attraction is in large part due to the experience of knowing which colors and styles are popular in my favorite genres. I see it and want to touch it, to know more about the story and feelings I might find inside. It is quickly more than the cover. As I read the hints and meaning represented on the cover reveal themselves. They change for me.

The kids, I guess, were like covers on books. People were looking at them and seeing more than I was because the other adults knew them better. They knew more of the stories inside and, hence, were able to recognize more meaning beyond the cover itself within the cover itself.

I saw them too, but not as much with my eyes. Hardly with my eyes. I guess, since kids are not books, there wasn’t the need to pick and choose which ones to pay attention to, which cover to reach out and hold. Their stories would simply reveal themselves and I was open to all the genres around me.  

I do try to use seeing more, but I often get it wrong. My mom has noticed. She’s noticed for years. I don’t seem to see what others are seeing. My sister has noticed, too. When I have been watching her kids in her house and she comes home, she's learned to be careful not to immediately say, "I need to clean this house," because, most likely, I think I already did it for her. I often see clean, I often see not broken, when others see dirty and broken.

I don’t mind, mostly. This is not a huge issue and hardly worth exploring. But sometimes I worry that it means I am the reason everyone is feeling uncomfortable, and I don’t know it. Because I don’t see right, I might not know how wrong I look.

I don’t see quite the same as others so when I try, I worry I’m getting it wrong. The point is, to fix it I’d have to see what they see.

Here’s the rub, I mostly like not seeing. It is a newer discovery about myself. I like it. I like hardly noticing these things.

And it is hard to learn a new skill. So, maybe I also like liking it, so I don’t have to learn.

There is the risk of missing an important clue about a loved one or myself, a change in appearance that is a symptom in need of investigation. So far, though, others have been helpful in pointing these things out. (Recently, when a cat was losing weight but I hadn’t noticed, the problem was addressed, because other people noticed.)

So, for now, I think I like not seeing.

Do you see?

Hugs, smiles, and love!

Autism Answers with Tsara Shelton (Facebook)

Autism Answer: Inclusion Please, Because I'm Self-Centered and a Little Bit Selfish

 

Some of my family taking a break during a hike

Look, there are a lot of reasons I advocate for a more inclusive and visibly diverse world. I want my brothers (who have various disabilities and challenges) to know there are places for them in society where they can grow their talents while having uncommon challenges and reactions to things. I want my sons (who are a variety pack of colors and sexual orientations) to see romance, relationships, and success around them in so many different styles they can't help but know they, too, can create something that works for them and will be welcomed in the world. I want so many more things of this nature for the people I love as well as people I don't know but would probably also choose to love.

 

I am interrupting my program with this important message: Watch Living with Lynette to see inclusion in action!

 

However, I confess something. The more I think about how the world could change for people I love if it was more inclusive and diverse, the more I want it for me. The more I want it for my own challenges and reactions. 

 

I want to see and read what it is to live with all these things I don't understand so I can learn how to best be kind. I don't want to always put others in the position of teaching me how to be kind to them; I want to watch it all in action and have ample opportunities to learn.

 

Show me stutters and tics, and let me feel more comfortable around them so I can be kinder. Let me read stories from minds that work against themselves or in extremes, so perhaps I can have a perspective that grows my ability to be around more people. I want more stories of romance and sexual exploration with people who have sensory challenges or physical limitations so I can anticipate the beauty of my own aging and physical changes and normalize the very wonderful skill of communicating ourselves to our partners. 

 

There is more. But you see what I'm confessing here, right? That I am self-centered and a bit selfish.

 

When I was younger I thought my mom was crazy for believing the world should make room for my brothers. I mean, what the heck? They were not like anyone anywhere and who wants to figure it all out? Then I got less mean and realized, dang. Mom is right and I am a mean, mean, mean sister. I started getting to know my brothers rather than only think of them as people to help mom keep an eye on and I realized, they are people with harder for me to understand challenges, but they have no less and no more right to a fulfilling life than me. So I started working with my mom and asking the world to be more inclusive, for the sake of them. 

 

Or, I thought it was for them. But I am a self-centered girl and, actually, I'm beginning to notice it is - yes -for the sake of my family but more for the sake of me. If my family is accepted I am free to stop doing the work of asking them to be accepted. But, admittedly, more than that if the world is more inclusive and diverse I will not feel as much pressure to know how to be around people who are drastically different. Because I will have seen and read and experienced enough of it to be able to figure it out with more ease and less pressure. 

 

I won't feel as much like, "This is your chance to prove you know how to be around difference so get it right, lady." Because, well, the world will give me more opportunities to see and experience disabilities and differences. 

 

So, yes. Please. If you are willing to put yourself out there, if you are willing to write, be a guest expert on a talk show, star in a movie, rock out in a music video, anything at all where we can see you and interact with you and learn what interactions you like best and why, I would appreciate it. Whoever you are. 

 

I confess, I want it because I'm self-centered and a little bit selfish. I want it for my sake. 

 

But I also think it will benefit other people. So if that makes me sound nicer, let that be the take away.

 

 Hugs, smiles, and love!

Autism Answers with Tsara Shelton (Facebook)