i read it last night. i thought it was supposed to be about a kid with Asperger's, because that's what it said on the back of the audiobook. (i got the audiobook first, for Garret.) the hardcopy was checked out at the library then. but the book-book doesn't say Asperger's on the jacket description, just autism.
either way, it was a pretty good book.
i decided i don't like the audiobook version though. i listened to the first bit of that, because Garret said, "You have to listen to this."
So I did.
the guy who reads the audiobook goes too slow and thoughtful. the book-book was MUCH better. and it had excellent diagrams and footnotes. the syntax was flesh and not choke, and it raced into my head very nice, so that was the part i liked best.
but i feel a little unresolved about Wellington-the-Dog getting stabbed with a garden fork. i guess that's why the author made him a poodle, so i wouldn't have to be too distressed about it. because no one likes poodles.
3/13/08
Fear. Anger. Quitting.
My heart is racing, I'm shaking & dizzy. It's like a weird, in-between panic attack. I'm not gasping for air or having chest pains like a full-blown panic attack-- just shaking, shaking.
I'm afraid 100% of the time, and since I hate that, I end up angry 100% of the time, since anger is slightly better.
Online people ought to be safer. They aren't as real. They're nicely two-dimensional. I get just as angry and afraid from online confrontation though.
Garret always asks me just what exactly it is that I think people are going to do... I don't know.
I just hate this sick, awful feeling. And I can't stand very much of it. So I quit most things. Because most things deal with people. And people cause it.
I am often afraid that I'm going to be a serial killer. When I think about people dying and screaming, I feel calmer. Soothed. It makes me laugh. Makes the anger and the panic stop.
I'm afraid 100% of the time, and since I hate that, I end up angry 100% of the time, since anger is slightly better.
Online people ought to be safer. They aren't as real. They're nicely two-dimensional. I get just as angry and afraid from online confrontation though.
Garret always asks me just what exactly it is that I think people are going to do... I don't know.
I just hate this sick, awful feeling. And I can't stand very much of it. So I quit most things. Because most things deal with people. And people cause it.
I am often afraid that I'm going to be a serial killer. When I think about people dying and screaming, I feel calmer. Soothed. It makes me laugh. Makes the anger and the panic stop.
2/18/08
Stupid people who think I'm beneath them...
First off, stupid people can be delightful. I will forever and absolutely love Joey from high school for believing that M&Ms expand in your stomach and if you eat too many you can die, and also for lacking the math skills necessary to buy drugs.
But I really get annoyed by idiots that think they are the shiny penny.
The people who keep explaining things to me that I already grasp, when they are SO missing the point.
Just like slutty-girl in the 7th grade lunch line, who gasped and said, "Like, you are in THAT class? I thought you, were like, in the OTHER special ed, with like, retards."
Slutty-girl was very helpful. She made me realize that many of my perfectly intelligent sentences were actually mistaken for nonsense by those in the genetic kiddie-pool.
But I still have this problem with adults, all these years later.
I am not sure what to do with it sometimes because I find the motivations of people to be strange. What is the point of someone talking to me if all they want to do is act like everything is going over my head and I should tremble in awe of their superior mediocrity??? Seriously? WHY? They have self-esteem issues and need to pretend they are smart?
I don't get it. It really bothers me when I don't know why people are messing with me. I just can't see the point and it stresses me out. I want to solve the puzzle of it.
I also get into trouble because I assume OTHER people are secretly smart, since I get misjudged so often. Sadly, this is not usually the case, but I get tangled up in a lot of paranoia before I figure that out...
But I really get annoyed by idiots that think they are the shiny penny.
The people who keep explaining things to me that I already grasp, when they are SO missing the point.
Just like slutty-girl in the 7th grade lunch line, who gasped and said, "Like, you are in THAT class? I thought you, were like, in the OTHER special ed, with like, retards."
Slutty-girl was very helpful. She made me realize that many of my perfectly intelligent sentences were actually mistaken for nonsense by those in the genetic kiddie-pool.
But I still have this problem with adults, all these years later.
I am not sure what to do with it sometimes because I find the motivations of people to be strange. What is the point of someone talking to me if all they want to do is act like everything is going over my head and I should tremble in awe of their superior mediocrity??? Seriously? WHY? They have self-esteem issues and need to pretend they are smart?
I don't get it. It really bothers me when I don't know why people are messing with me. I just can't see the point and it stresses me out. I want to solve the puzzle of it.
I also get into trouble because I assume OTHER people are secretly smart, since I get misjudged so often. Sadly, this is not usually the case, but I get tangled up in a lot of paranoia before I figure that out...
Me vs. All There Is To Say
This could possibly also be thought of as Aspie vs NT, but I don't know that for sure, so For Sure is is just the blog title for today.
ME: fish fish dead fish. gaping eyed. dead breath fish. image slam: hook lip jerk, head crash fill impotent sensless repeat repeat reap eat repeat. struggling shocked fish. fading glassy eye slap. sloe death. flap. flap. gasping trap. sir, i believe he's been struck in the eye with a mackrel. blink open reality, things are ALWAYS REPEAT. reap what you eat. beefit's what's for dinner? fish.
All there is to Say/Explain out loud: I feel hurt.
My head is filled with nonsense. You cannot come in. I am so tired. English is not enough.
ME: fish fish dead fish. gaping eyed. dead breath fish. image slam: hook lip jerk, head crash fill impotent sensless repeat repeat reap eat repeat. struggling shocked fish. fading glassy eye slap. sloe death. flap. flap. gasping trap. sir, i believe he's been struck in the eye with a mackrel. blink open reality, things are ALWAYS REPEAT. reap what you eat. beefit's what's for dinner? fish.
All there is to Say/Explain out loud: I feel hurt.
My head is filled with nonsense. You cannot come in. I am so tired. English is not enough.
2/6/08
Executive dysfunction
Really Amanda, i thought you possessed better powers of observation than this.
i KNOW!!! i'm retarded.
grrr. we have been aware of AS for 5 months now. have read the term executive dysfunction. have even googled it before and skimmed some deffinitions... but it wasn't until just now, when i read the term in conjunction with MOTIVATION that i really paid attention.
sigh.
of course, it might also be that i have walked into the kitchen over 20 times today: thought about how my stomach is growling. that i feel hungry. seen that there are no clean pans. thought about pizza. thought about washing a pan. stomach growls again. i walk out of the kitchen. repeat. repeat. repeat.
i swear i would starve to death without intervention.
i don't know. i don't want to take medication. and i hate psychologists. i don't know if anything could really help me anyway... :( but i wish there was a good neuropsychologist nearby that had actually heard of AS so that i could at least ask.
i KNOW!!! i'm retarded.
grrr. we have been aware of AS for 5 months now. have read the term executive dysfunction. have even googled it before and skimmed some deffinitions... but it wasn't until just now, when i read the term in conjunction with MOTIVATION that i really paid attention.
sigh.
of course, it might also be that i have walked into the kitchen over 20 times today: thought about how my stomach is growling. that i feel hungry. seen that there are no clean pans. thought about pizza. thought about washing a pan. stomach growls again. i walk out of the kitchen. repeat. repeat. repeat.
i swear i would starve to death without intervention.
i don't know. i don't want to take medication. and i hate psychologists. i don't know if anything could really help me anyway... :( but i wish there was a good neuropsychologist nearby that had actually heard of AS so that i could at least ask.
1/16/08
Seer page 14
TIME
After you quit being stupid and learn to read, you notice you are very stupid with time. Sometime around age 2-5, Mommy and Daddy and School and Church, ALL have clocks and time that confuse you, and all try to show you how to read a clock. A smart girl like you that could read at 1, should certainly be able to tell time, so stop being stupid and pay attention. But you never really master this skill. You never learn to like wearing a watch. And even when you are in high school, and in Spanish class, you do very poorly, because one of the first things you learn in Spanish is how to tell time in Spanish, and the test papers always have drawings of clocks, and only a few pictures of digital-clocks that just TELL you what the time is in ENGLISH. And no one will believe that a fourteen year old girl can’t tell time, and think that you must just not know the Spanish, and are making excuses. But actually, you are just stupid when it comes to clocks and telling time. And this is a very big theme throughout your life.
And before you are introduced to clocks, you are mostly always happy.
(And when you break all the clocks, you will be happy again.)
But today is not time yet, so today is: Mommy has a giant hourglass.
It is as big as you are, but still below Mommy’s hip. And you love to watch all that sand pour and pour, and flip over and pour again. Like a figure 8 that spins. You love to spin. Especially in the chair by the window, but you cracked your chin open doing that, and it bled a lot. But the hourglass is a nice, safe, spin, because it is so slow.
And I can stop time! Or at least the sand. But, when the sand stops, the second hand on the clock still ticks, and I don’t understand that. But I think if may be I was small enough to fit inside the hourglass completely, and I had the clock in my hand, like a wristwatch, I bet that watch WOULD stop. And also, I can not make time go backward when I flip it over, even if I do it very fast, or before it is all the way done. The time still just goes forward and not back and forth like a seesaw, like it should.
But you still think about the space INSIDE the glass, and if, IT is going backwards inside the glass, and only forwards on the outside where you are. And you suspect that other clock is getting in the way, but Mommy will not take the hourglass outside, and it is too big and heavy for you to carry by yourself.
Later she gets 2 smaller hourglasses. I like to play with them too, and I hope that Mommy will collect LOTS of hourglasses, but… she does not. And she seems to be bored of hourglasses now, so maybe it was just a phase, because now Mommy wants an Atlas statue instead of another hourglass. (But later, she will get a melted-looking clock like Dali drew, and you will love that almost as much as hourglasses.)
And here is the important thing to know about statues--- I am the statue of The Thinker. I sit. I ponder. (But Daddy says— No, that is Dobie Gillis’s statue, which is a character on an old black and white T.V. show called The many loves of Dobie Gillis that they play on Nick at Night, but for real… it is MINE too.) I rest my chin on my fist and THINK.
But not everyone has the same statue. And you can really learn a lot about someone by what statue they think of themselves as. Like Mommy, she likes the statue of Atlas. But NOT a triumphant or happy kind of Atlas—just the sad one of Atlas being crushed down by the heavy world on his shoulders, the one where he is struggling, and looks like his legs are going to give out any second, but they don’t, because he is a statue, so he is trapped and frozen in that last second of crushing pain. And Mommy says she LOVES that statue because Atlas looks exactly how Mommy feels, and you are in middle or high school when she tells you that last part, the WHY she loves Atlas, and it makes you feel very sad for Mommy.
And you think they should make Atlas with a removable world, so sometimes you could lift the world off, and turn him upside-down on his head, and let him do a handstand for a while… Or make an Atlas that twirls the world on one finger like a basketball… or something.
(And this is why you read Atlas Shrugged later in life, because it has such an interesting title, but in that book, Atlas shrugs with indifference or apathy or even hatred for the world, because he shrugs so that the world will FALL and DIE because he is tired of holding those stupid losers up.)
But back at 2-8 age, you are just thinking that Atlas is not in any real danger of being crushed, because the world is surrounded by so much SPACE, his legs would just be floating along behind the earth, because, what could he be standing ON? The Moon? An invisible planet? You don't think holding the world would be too much trouble with zero gravity to help you.
But. You DO worry that the earth will float away from Atlas...
and he will be left behind.
All alone. In all that space.
After you quit being stupid and learn to read, you notice you are very stupid with time. Sometime around age 2-5, Mommy and Daddy and School and Church, ALL have clocks and time that confuse you, and all try to show you how to read a clock. A smart girl like you that could read at 1, should certainly be able to tell time, so stop being stupid and pay attention. But you never really master this skill. You never learn to like wearing a watch. And even when you are in high school, and in Spanish class, you do very poorly, because one of the first things you learn in Spanish is how to tell time in Spanish, and the test papers always have drawings of clocks, and only a few pictures of digital-clocks that just TELL you what the time is in ENGLISH. And no one will believe that a fourteen year old girl can’t tell time, and think that you must just not know the Spanish, and are making excuses. But actually, you are just stupid when it comes to clocks and telling time. And this is a very big theme throughout your life.
And before you are introduced to clocks, you are mostly always happy.
(And when you break all the clocks, you will be happy again.)
But today is not time yet, so today is: Mommy has a giant hourglass.
It is as big as you are, but still below Mommy’s hip. And you love to watch all that sand pour and pour, and flip over and pour again. Like a figure 8 that spins. You love to spin. Especially in the chair by the window, but you cracked your chin open doing that, and it bled a lot. But the hourglass is a nice, safe, spin, because it is so slow.
And I can stop time! Or at least the sand. But, when the sand stops, the second hand on the clock still ticks, and I don’t understand that. But I think if may be I was small enough to fit inside the hourglass completely, and I had the clock in my hand, like a wristwatch, I bet that watch WOULD stop. And also, I can not make time go backward when I flip it over, even if I do it very fast, or before it is all the way done. The time still just goes forward and not back and forth like a seesaw, like it should.
But you still think about the space INSIDE the glass, and if, IT is going backwards inside the glass, and only forwards on the outside where you are. And you suspect that other clock is getting in the way, but Mommy will not take the hourglass outside, and it is too big and heavy for you to carry by yourself.
Later she gets 2 smaller hourglasses. I like to play with them too, and I hope that Mommy will collect LOTS of hourglasses, but… she does not. And she seems to be bored of hourglasses now, so maybe it was just a phase, because now Mommy wants an Atlas statue instead of another hourglass. (But later, she will get a melted-looking clock like Dali drew, and you will love that almost as much as hourglasses.)
And here is the important thing to know about statues--- I am the statue of The Thinker. I sit. I ponder. (But Daddy says— No, that is Dobie Gillis’s statue, which is a character on an old black and white T.V. show called The many loves of Dobie Gillis that they play on Nick at Night, but for real… it is MINE too.) I rest my chin on my fist and THINK.
But not everyone has the same statue. And you can really learn a lot about someone by what statue they think of themselves as. Like Mommy, she likes the statue of Atlas. But NOT a triumphant or happy kind of Atlas—just the sad one of Atlas being crushed down by the heavy world on his shoulders, the one where he is struggling, and looks like his legs are going to give out any second, but they don’t, because he is a statue, so he is trapped and frozen in that last second of crushing pain. And Mommy says she LOVES that statue because Atlas looks exactly how Mommy feels, and you are in middle or high school when she tells you that last part, the WHY she loves Atlas, and it makes you feel very sad for Mommy.
And you think they should make Atlas with a removable world, so sometimes you could lift the world off, and turn him upside-down on his head, and let him do a handstand for a while… Or make an Atlas that twirls the world on one finger like a basketball… or something.
(And this is why you read Atlas Shrugged later in life, because it has such an interesting title, but in that book, Atlas shrugs with indifference or apathy or even hatred for the world, because he shrugs so that the world will FALL and DIE because he is tired of holding those stupid losers up.)
But back at 2-8 age, you are just thinking that Atlas is not in any real danger of being crushed, because the world is surrounded by so much SPACE, his legs would just be floating along behind the earth, because, what could he be standing ON? The Moon? An invisible planet? You don't think holding the world would be too much trouble with zero gravity to help you.
But. You DO worry that the earth will float away from Atlas...
and he will be left behind.
All alone. In all that space.
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