17. Memory

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Miss Sunshine is having the most amazing growth spurt and today she reminded me to buy her “period pants” in the supermarket. Her puberty sprang on her suddenly.

I am unsure how much of Little Miss Sunshine will evolve into Teen Miss Sunshine.

-o-

It was not always like that.

When Miss Sunshine was born, a vague and unexplored layer opened up in my life. Like a searchlight piercing the night sky with intent, I went exploring into my mind and into my memories.

Her arrival into my life opened up a side of me that I was not familiar with.

Miss Sunshine is autistic. Almost everything has a different meaning and without helpful and kind guidance, those differences can be damaging to an autistic mind.

Thanks to Little Miss Sunshine, I discovered that I am autistic too.

Some of our differences can be managed with love and care. Other differences are transitory, and still others are part of the fabric that makes us unique. Our mental processes and perception of self and the world around us is not quite the same as that of  neurotypical people.

As I explained once when she was starting school,

” Our computer CPU -our brain- is wired a bit differently.

We have strange superpowers and also strange weaknesses. We are no better or worse. We are just different. With a bit of training and self control we can even blend in with the crowd, if we want.”

Make no mistake when I say we are different to the core.

We are alien travelers but we are human too.

-o-

My heart weeps for the kids that have suffered lobotomies, sedation, isolation and abuse; or who have been neglected at the hands of their families, doctors or schools.

For those that were called “spawns of the devil”, “tontos”, “cretins”, “witches”, “retards”.
For the ones who were locked up, burnt at the stake or thrown into a bog pit.
For the ones who could not defend themselves.

For the ones who chose suicide instead of fighting back.

-o-

A neurodivergent individual should learn defensive skills and be prepared to use them. These are critical to keep integrity of the self, and to protect that part of our nature that is the target of the bully.

This is a skill that I learnt earlier in life -indirectly- because of Mr. Fascist’s fascist leanings.

-o-

We are part of every culture. There is the savant, the lonely genius, the supernatural warrior, the wolf-boy, the shaman speaking in tongues, and all the other kinds of people living outside the norm.

Unicorns, in our house parlance, historically lived meagre lives and succumbed to poverty, abuse and persecution. Even geniuses like Van Gogh or Nikola Tesla -both rumoured to be “in the spectrum”- were not given a fair chance by the world.

We have been targets of systematic killings in the name of a healthier society. Many times over.

These insults and outrages explain my contempt and disgust for theories of eugenics, racial superiority, blood purity, volkisch movements and all of that nonsense.

-o-

I do not know what the fuck we did to neurotypicals in the remote evolutionary past.

-o-

I want to teach Little Miss Sunshine that we have always been there and we can’t be silenced.

The only danger is that we are our worst enemies. We fill our heads with too much shit, self doubt, recrimination and false hopes.

We have the misguided belief that if we blend in with the neurotypicals, our quirks will be gone and replaced with boring normality and acceptance.

We see the others as “better” and we see ourselves as “not that better”.

We create worlds that are so good that we forget that we live in a reality that is not as good as our dreams. And we succumb to depression and despair when we find out that awful truth: reality is shit. It’s boring. It’s predictable. It’s unfair.

The enemy is always lurking in our heads.

We have to be strong so that the memory of our joy, our creativity and our love is passed on to others.

We deserve to be good to ourselves and accept who we are.

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