Autism (part 3)

It is interesting to me how much this blog post has become more of a personal diary. True to my autistic invisibility, no views on my previous post. No followers. No comments in the nearly two years I have been running this site. Visitors stand at 3/250 and 2 of them are me. That makes it safe for me to write in the most honest of ways. The more I study and research autism, the more real it becomes in an intellectual sense. The entire process for me has been a strange journey into the unknown.

An adventure into the "whys" of my life.

Why was I so precocious as a child? Why did so many people treat me differently? Why couldn't I make and keep friends? Why was I advanced in my thinking, but treated like I was ignorant by most of my teachers? Why was I bullied so mercilessly? Why was my family always ashamed of me? Why am I so clumsy and uncoordinated? Why did I burn out at any public sector jobs that I held, ever so briefly? Why was I always looked over for raises and promotions? Why did everyone treat me like I was rude or a liar? Why is the loneliness so crushing? Why do I shut down, unable to speak or interact? Why do I retract into darkness and solitude? There was and are a lot of "whys" in autism. Maybe it should be changed to AUTYSM for that reason...

Even now, with a writing award and several novels under my belt, I can't reach my audience that I know is out there, somewhere in the world. No agent will ever reply to a query letter. No publishing company will ever notice. Eight billion people, and no one can hear my voice. The neurotypical world is all about connections, and power, and buying prestige and recognition. Autistic people don't have that access to connections, or friendships. I could care less about money and power. I just want to bring hope and understanding to others in the only way I know how. Most autistics, myself included, are destined to live in devastating poverty, no matter how formidable our intellect can be. We simply exist as outcasts in a fearful world that can't understand us and refuses to try.

I suppose it's odd then, that I feel particularly blessed to be who I am and where I am. I don't just plow blindly through the world seeking to fill up emptiness with folly and pleasure. I experience life in fine detail, in scents and sounds unknown to the neurotypical majority. I can see into the depths of space, and into the miniature interactions of the tiniest and most mundane of things. I examine and live my faith authentically. I find connections where no one else can. I share with my loved ones deeply and uniquely. I can do things that others consider impossible. I can reason and explore possibilities that stretch beyond the simplicity of human reality. I am content not having and possessing, because I know the value of just being alive isn't about what we have, but what we are and how we give. Happiness isn't about popularity, or fads, or fashion, or the newest TV show, or what the divas are doing, or what sports team is in the lead. Those things are all smoke and mirrors, nothing more than the modern version of the gladiatorial spectacle to keep the masses distracted. The reality? It's about love, experiencing all the natural world has without blinders on, it's about giving back, even when you have very little yourself. It's about empathy. It's about honesty, even when you are all alone. Even when no one will ever hear your voice. You are your only legacy.