2017 in Review

As 2018 is about to get itself underway, I find I’m still an accidental resident of Mount Savage, MD.  Accidental in that I never intended to be here and then when I found myself here, it was only supposed to be for a few days. That was just over a year ago.  My neighbors include a couple of giant raccoons, a fearless Momma possum, some rogue deer, and judging from the scratch marks on the deck… a black bear that wants to be a whole lot more friendly than makes me comfortable.  There’s an assortment of dogs and cats and even some humans, too.  I’ve managed to meet a few of them, even some of the people, this past year and one person, Barbara, has transformed from possibly the most negative and prickly woman I’ve ever met into a true and faithful friend.

I’ve only begun to explore my habitat but already found that Mount Savage is one of those historically significant places that no one’s ever really heard about.  Through the convergence of location and natural resource availability, it became a center of industry in the late 1800s and has fame for rolling the steel for the first railroad track ever produced in the United States. It was also a company-owned town for a time when the clay taken from the surrounding mountains produced a uniquely high-quality brick that’s still prized by collectors and those doing period-correct property restorations.  One day I want to find out more and go take some photos of the old brick ovens. I also want to check out the museum now housed in the town’s original one-cell jail built specifically to provide drunks a safe place to sleep it off.

One of the things that kept me from exploring was an accident early in the year where I badly injured my right shoulder. That ‘grounded’ me for several months. With Jack’s efforts as nursemaid, support brace, heating pad, exercise machine, and 24/7 comforter, the breaks and tears and nerve damage of a total dislocation are probably about as healed as they’re ever going to get now and it’s mostly ok.  There are some activities it inhibits, though… Like crocheting and cooking and cutting the dog’s toenails.  Those have become decidedly short-duration undertakings due to the numb fingers they trigger.  I also had to take time off school because I couldn’t get my hand up to the computer keyboard to post in discussions and write all those papers but I’m back at it now and making progress.  A few days ago I had that breakthrough moment where I actually felt competent talking Psychology and that this might be a real viable career choice for my last shot at that sort of stuff.  That was an awesome feeling!

The most exotic place I’ve been this whole year is the County dump.  It’s a unique arrangement here where you have to stop along the way at a specific Payless Drug and buy stickers to put on your trash bags.  They are $1 each and every bag needs one.  If you arrive on site without them, you’ll be ushered the 7-ish miles halfway back to town, or about the same distance on out the road to a different store in another town, to get them.  Just ask me how I know this…

I’m still being a culinary adventurer.  This year’s ‘new to me’ winner foods include quince, Sugar cakes, and Apple Pan Dowdy.  Quince is a fruit that resembles a yellow apple but has a much more perfume-like scent and taste.  I understand (now) that it’s meant to be cooked but when I found some at the grocery store I just bought one to taste and me and the boys ate it raw. I’m intrigued enough to put it in the orchard I’m imagining for my someday place… and Lightning, my resident foodie, found it delicious.  Sugar Cakes are huge, pillowy, cake-like sugar cookies.  Imagine a Lofthouse cookie and a homemade yellow cake had a round pale-faced baby… and you’re sort of close.  They can be frosted when cooled or just sprinkled with a little sugar prior to baking.  Oh, they are yummy! And Apple Pan Dowdy may be my favorite dessert ever.  It is the perfect combination of pie and bread pudding and caramelly baked apples. Where has this been my whole life?  The Sugar Cakes, Apple Pan Dowdy, and several uniquely Pennsylvania Dutch dishes like Slippery Pot Pie and Rivvel Soup are Barbara’s contribution to expanding my gastronomic curiosity.

Gizmo kissed a cat.  And the cat liked it!  Out of all my guys, his herding tendency made me worried about how he’d get on with the cats.  But he loves Crybaby, a yellow-striped tom that’s also part of this motley crew, and Crybaby loves him.  Crybaby actually likes all the boys and works hard to engage them in goofy little games much to his Mommy’s consternation…  Barbara is over-worried one of them is going to pounce “and break his back because they are so big and rough.” Yes, you just heard my eyes roll but I respect her discomfort and regularly call them off.

Plans for 2018 include finishing up the final classes for my BA in Psychology, making my final selection for grad school, and getting things underway for my MA.  My concentration area has been Social Psychology but I’ve enjoyed the Forensics classes so much more that I think that’s where I will focus my graduate work.  My other goals are pretty tightly focused on job and home and community getting adequately situated in all of them.  I also want to get back to taking little adventures and finding delight in the extraordinary details of day-to-day life that exist if I’m purposeful in paying attention to them. And if I can, I hope to sneak in some art and creative writing.  Which brings us to the goal that’s relevant to this blog: When my life isn’t all that interesting, I lose steam.  So… either I’m going to live a blog-worthy life or take the blog down in this coming year.

Life With Aaron

In the words of my friend and his mother, Angela Henderson...

Aaron today.

On January 19, 1990 we brought a beautiful baby boy into the world and named him Aaron.  He arrived 4 1/2 weeks earlier than we planned and weighed in at just 5 lbs 2 oz.  He was a tiny 18 inches long.  What he lacked in size at birth, he has more than made up for as an adult!!

It wasn't until Aaron was about 8 months old that we knew something was wrong.  He wouldn't grasp or play with a toy or rattle.  He didn't roll over, sit up on his own, crawl or scoot like most babies do.  Often, he'd sit in his swing or carrier or crib and just stare off into space.  He didn't look into our eyes and even when we were speaking to him, he rarely acknowledged us.  But he was a very good baby!  He slept through the night - 6 full hours - by the time he was 2 1/2 months old.  He rarely fussed or cried.  He was content to just sit and stare at the wall.  I guess that sums his babyhood up - he always seemed content.  We were often told how lucky we were to have such a "good baby."

Even his pediatrician didn't notice until I mentioned my concerns to him.  Finally he recommended we visit a child development center and at 10 months old Aaron began attending a developmental pre-school and was diagnosed as moderately mentally handicapped.  Soon we were overwhelmed with his therapy.  There were several different occupational therapies, physical therapies and speech therapies.

A little past age 2, Aaron finally took his first steps and got his first tooth.  We were grinding up food from family dinners to resemble baby food because he lacked teeth... actually, Aaron is now 23 and still has some of his baby teeth!

But Aaron still had no words back then and he became more and more frustrated.  I can remember many times sitting on the floor with him with my arms wrapped around his little chest until he was done throwing his tantrum.  If I didn't hold him this way, he'd bang his head on the floor or bite himself.  When he started to learn sign language life got a little easier for us.  The tantrums got farther and farther apart because he was finally able to communicate with us.

At age 5 he started Kindergarten and what happened next caught us all by surprise!  Aaron had an aid that was just his and went through his entire day at school with him.  She was out of this world wonderful and she loved and cared for Aaron like he was her own.  Not long into the school year, Aaron began to say words and by the end of the year he was talking.  When I say talking, I don't mean like you and I talk... he has a very monotone voice, no emotion, no fluctuation.  And he would repeat and repeat and repeat everything over and over.  But he was finally talking...  And I fully credit his aid for this gift!!

When 1st Grade started up in the fall, Aaron was reading. We had read to him all the time.  ALL.THE.TIME.  To this day I can still recite Dr. Suess' ABCs!  Aaron loves books and music and they helped calm him down then and they still do today.  We could hardly believe how quickly he was learning and while I knew he'd never be "normal" I wanted him to reach his full potential.  We pushed, encouraged and helped him in every way we could.  There's nothing my son can't do - we've never set limitations for him.  He is so very smart!!

By 4th Grade, Aaron was an A-B student on a modified curriculum.  He studied hard and earned those grades by himself.  He could spell almost any word you'd give him; he knew all the states and their capitals, every Cardinal baseball player's number and which driver went with what car in NASCAR.  That is when we realized our child is not mentally retarded.  So I kept pushing the teacher, the school, and the counselors to do more testing.  In 5th grade, Aaron was finally given the proper diagnosis of autism.  I thought, "Of course!!  How could I have not seen it?"  The flapping hands, fascination with things that spin, ignoring us, not responding to his name 80% of the time, the echolalia and the need for a very rigid schedule are all classic symptoms.

Aaron participates in Special Olympics
and L.O.V.E.S. every moment!!

Now we had the opportunity to really help him excel.  We developed, along with the school, an IEP (Individualized Education Plan) with goals and benchmarks.  One of the biggest struggles was getting him to respond and react to his peers in an acceptable manner.  Thankfully they loved him, helped him and accepted him just as he was.  He attended St. Bernard Catholic School and graduated 8th grade as an Honors Student.  Then came the scariest moment of MY life... mainstreaming him into a regular High School.  I was so scared for what might happen, but again he had some wonderful helpers and was accepted.  Of course you'll always find a few jerks, but for the most part he had 200+ friends who always had his back.  Thinking about that time now always makes me smile BIG!

Aaron excelled in everything he tried and he loved learning and being at school.  Things weren't easy and we still had lots of therapy, meetings and conferences with case workers but he was a successful student.  In 2009 he graduated from South Spencer High School (Indiana state law allows a child with a disability to stay in public school through their 22nd birthday year) with his class and the friends he'd grown up with.  I remember sitting in the bleachers and when they called his name the entire gym of 1,000 people or more burst into thunderous applause.  I had tears running down my face realizing just how many lives Aaron had touched.

Aaron continued his education at the High School that fall and that's when things started to fall apart...  his support system was gone:  His friends had graduated and were gone on to college and jobs.  I'd worked at the school since 2000 so I'd always been there with him and then, 2 months into the school year, my job was terminated.  I also had knee replacement surgery that had me out of commission for about 6 weeks so I wasn't there for him in the same way at home either.  He got a new teacher when the one he'd worked with for the last 4 years left the school.  And his brother left for college further disrupting his day-to-day routines.  And with all these changes, Aaron started to change.  He reverted back to staring into space and not paying attention to anything or anyone.  He stopped listening to music, stopped playing his games and he carries on a constant conversation with himself.  There is no eye contact, he won't answer when you call his name or ask him a question.  I've cried and cried.  We worked so hard to get him where he was.  What is going on now?

Aaron and his brothers he loves and who love him!

We've seen a barrage of doctors who've run all kinds of tests ranging from blood work to hearing tests to an EEG to check for seizures.  Nothing!  Every test is negative.  There doesn't appear to be  anything medically wrong.  Hardest of all to bear, he wants absolutely nothing to do with me.  Every time he walks into a room and ignores my existence, it feels like my heart is being ripped out and stomped on.  I am utterly and completely at a loss for what to do to help him... to bring our sweet Aaron back to us.  We are currently on the waiting list for the Christian Sarkin Autism Center in Indianapolis and back to square one.

I love Aaron so very much!  And I so want to find the key that will unlock his mind...

Whatever Happened to Little Dresses?

Photo credit goes to http://what-i-found.blogspot.com/
though I didn't find the exact post in the vast collection of
patterns and catalogs of all kinds of vintage clothing.

 Today is my birthday.  And I'm feeling a little bit sentimental and looking back at my personal history...

This picture popped up in my perusal of Pinterest today and reminded me that when I started first grade at Dean Goodsell Elementary School in 1969, all of us little girls were required to wear a dress every day.  Me and my fellow female classmates brought our bright, shiny, smiling faces to the classroom in little dresses like these each day.  I remember all of us having some variation of this very dress.

Even in Idaho's cold winters we had to wear dresses.  Shelley, ID is one of those places that usually has an abundance of snow.  It's cold and slippery on those tiny Mary Janes and when it melts, the playground becomes a field of squishy mud that sucks on the soles of your shoes with every step.  There's usually a flash of warmer weather about this time of year called "the January thaw."  And then it freezes.  Hard.  As in days and days of sub-zero temperatures.  And that waterlogged field behind the school becomes a sheet of pure ice.  (I remember in Jr. High once when it froze the doors to the bus barn closed for a couple of unanticipated 'snow days' off from school.)

When I was little, we girls were permitted to wear pants on those horrifically cold days, but only under our dresses.  The dress was an ever present demand.

Even as a six-year-old, I hated dresses.  Play was limited because you didn't want everyone, especially the little boys, to see your underwear if you fell.  Or the wind, another ever present fact of life in Idaho, blew your skirt up.  So while the boys got to play kick ball and could jump from the playground's swings, girls were relegated to the more delicate activities like hopscotch and four-square.  I don't remember exactly why it was done, but I was one pretty darned happy kid when the school district changed the dress code to allow girls to wear pants outfits any day not long after my school career began.

I was so happy about it that I once went an entire school year without wearing a dress once.  Even those fashion nightmares of double-knit polyester and plaid wool for pants beat the heck out of dresses in my young mind!

But now I am wondering if easing the dress code was the beginning of the demise of the very idea that you should dress appropriately to be seen in public.  I'm thinking of the skimpy belly baring strappy tops and sagging over-size jeans that hug the bottoms of butt cheeks we see today's youth wearing.  You know... the fashions we 30-40-50-60-plus-year-old people deride and make fun of as hideous atrocities that violate humanity's sense of decency.

Did opening that door of choice more than 30 years ago lead to today's anything goes fashion mentality?  Is it why we all think it's ok to wear pajamas to Walmart?

And where are our fashion sensibilities today going to lead for the future?