Most of you will remember a fellow we all knew for many years as a comedian named Andy Kaufman. I loved the quirkiness of Andy, from the first time I saw him walk onto the stage of Saturday Night Live. He wasn’t a bit player. He wasn’t even on the roster, as I recall. He just came out as someone no one knew existed. Sort of an unknown special guest with a solo gig. But there he was, on the sound stage, before a packed studio audience, as if he didn’t know where he was, or how he’d gotten there. Like a disoriented tourist, lost on his way to the restroom.

Finding his way to center stage, Andy stopped and looked out at the audience as if they were a Hudson automobile coming at him with enormous speed; their headlights temporarily blinding his eyes. He awkwardly introduced himself with a very thick accent, and announced that he was going to entertain them with a few famous impressions. Then he turned his back to the audience to prepare for a transformation into a particular character. Turning back around, he began to recite familiar words that would identify the personality he was portraying, only it was in the same foreign accent that he had at the start, and did not sound anything like the intended person. He went through this ritual a few more times, each time with the same dismal results.

The audience wasn’t sure what to think, but they were ready to laugh, and they did, nervously. Finally, Andy said that for his last impression, he would like to do Elvis Presley. Everyone was waiting for him to dismally fail again, but to their surprise, when he turned around, he had transformed into a spot-on, believable portrayal of Elvis, sans the thick accent and nervous demeanor that had accompanied his other attempts. Immediately following this amazing performance, amidst a round of applause and laughter, he sank back into his original persona, and sheepishly bobble-headed his way off stage like an overjoyed immigrant who couldn’t believe that he had finally reached the Promised Land.

I have often felt like that character, in life. When I became old enough to critic myself, I realized that I had as lively a face as the guy at the mortuary who had just had his eyes and mouth glued shut. When I was sure that I was smiling, the casual observer would have thought I had just lost at Monopoly. When I talked, my jaw moved, but the rest of my face had no animation at all. If I had been a stroke victim, these things would have been easily explained, but I was just a normal kid, without facial expression. Also, when I listened to my voice on tape, it was so shockingly bland that I couldn’t stand it. I honestly thought my vocal expression was as up tempo as Aunt Bea on the Andy Griffith show, but along with the dead-pan face, my delivery was flat-lined as well. Add to that, the fact that I had absolutely no body language except that which constantly sent mixed or wrong signals, and I was about as flavorful as a cracker without salt.

Of course, if I or my parents had known that I had Asperger Syndrome, that would have at least given me a heads-up on my problems, but that revelation wouldn’t be forthcoming for decades. But something did find its way into my heart, so to speak. Something that seemed to deliver me from the bland persona that was me. It was music. When I listened to music, I could feel emotions that I couldn’t feel at any other time. In fact, when I sang, it was almost overwhelming to me. Even the simplest song would touch an emotional cord. I still can’t sing “Home On The Range” without becoming verklempt, but music became my greatest social salvation. I could so get into the tone and lyrical mode of it all, that I was suddenly transformed, alive, emotional, and full of expression. When the song ended, I would sink back into my old Andy Kaufman personality, but for that brief moment in time, I was able to express something that I had little ability to otherwise convey.

Of course, that foreign character Andy portrayed on stage, wasn’t real… or was it? I think the real Andy Kaufman probably had Asperger Syndrome, but for him, such a diagnosis was too far away. Andy died before the mainstream medical community could get around to believing what a certain Doctor Asperger had been saying for fifty years. Frustrating, isn’t it?!

I, on the other hand, have been given a blessing. The blessing of understanding so much more about myself than I ever did before. Things that used to confuse me, upset me, and sometimes even frighten me, don’t anymore. There is a reason for them. And I, for one, am relieved. Relieved to know that when I walk out on the stage of life, with the demeanor of a dead fish, and sing a song well, that’s enough. I have reached the Promised Land.

Here’s a little song I wrote. My lovely wife assisted me in putting it to video. It’s called “Wonderful.” I hope you enjoy it…

…we will be extending our going out of business sale indefinitely.

Don’t you just love it when people succeed? I know I do. I look at those who are successful, and I rejoice with them. I rejoice that my tax dollars won’t be going to support them. And I say to myself: “That could be you someday, Mark, old boy. Just hang in there long enough, and your ship will come in.” My ship has never quite come into port, but I’m looking out over the horizon of a very vast oil slick, hoping for just a glimpse of a sail. Oh, I’ve had a wonderful paddle boat or two, wash ashore from time to time, and a few dinghies now and again… and once I even found a bottle with a real, live Genie in it. But I’m talking about that really BIG freighter, setting low in the water, laden down with everything China has to offer. Yeah. That kind of ship.

How do we as humans measure success? I know it’s different all around the world. If I were living in deepest, darkest Africa, way down in the gnarly jungle, success for me might be measured in how many monkeys I was able to capture last week. If I lived at the very top of the world, it might be measured by how warm I could make a house built of ice blocks, and still keep it from melting. My wife would say to me “Nanook” (for that would be my name), “you are a good provider. You bring me seal fat, and whale bones. And you make my nose tingle when you walk into the igloo.” Yes, she would say that, and much more, for, with nothing more than that, I would be a successful Eskimo. Until, one day I would not return home from the hunt, due to a slightly more successful Polar Bear.

In America, it’s not that simple. I think anyone who’s ever seen the movie “Citizen Kane” would have to admit that, by all standards, Charles Foster Kane was the epitome of success. He had mansions, and newspaper companies, and women, and freaking giraffes running around in his front yard. Giraffes! You don’t get much more successful than that. Not where I come from.

But he died one day. And a little snow globe fell to the floor and broke. And all he could say was “Rosebud.” Who was Rosebud? That one final utterance that escaped the lips of a man who was more successful on earth than Donald Trump on steroids? That’s what the world wanted to know. Well if they’d fast forwarded to the end of the movie, they would have found out that Rosebud wasn’t a person at all. It was… (and if you haven’t seen the movie yet, stop reading now) …a snow sled. One he owned way back when he was a little boy. A sled he played with when he lived in a cold, dank shack out in the bitter, freezing country, with nothing but snow all around, and a little fire in the hearth to thaw him out at night.

He had freaking giraffes in the front yard, and all he could think about was some old piece of wood and metal, all rotten and rusted, which he used to play with before he was rich and famous. He could have brought a snow machine to his huge California Estate, and slid down artificial slopes on the back of a trained walrus, but no. He had to want that tiny little sled that wouldn’t even fit his big, rich, successful, bloated, grown-up body any more.

Well, I don’t know about you, but I’m starting to feel a little more successful every minute I think about it. I may not have giraffes running around in my front yard, but come to think of it, they’ve never been on my list of things to want anyway. And when you get right down to it, it’s not how many giraffes, or monkeys, or whale bones you bring home. Real success is measured in things less tangible. And, even if I don’t have a dime, I’ve got a whole warehouse full of intangibles. In fact, I think I see a brand new, great big, burgeoning boat-load of intangibles sailing into port, right now.

I was recently in a guy’s office talking to him about some of the subjects I am scheduled to teach this fall in his new Art Institute. He was needing some detailed information from me for each day’s agenda in a two week program, as well as another two week series, which we will rotate constantly, with other courses being offered throughout the season. Now, I’m not bad when it comes to writing down my thoughts, ideas and plans, but when it comes to listening to someone speak instructions, my mind often takes a left turn at Albuquerque. As we were discussing this, I mentioned to him (for the first time), that I have Asperger Syndrome. He suddenly switched gears, and without blinking an eye, began typing on his computer keyboard, adding, “Well, in that case, I’d better give you something visual to go along with our discussion.”

Wow. I couldn’t have been more impressed. In a couple of seconds he had printed out some pages which clearly defined exactly what we were talking about. Here was someone who actually understood the needs of many AS-ers, and definitely this one. You see, as I was totally unaware for 57 of my 60 years, that I had Asperger Syndrome, it was almost like a miracle to find someone whose head didn’t start spinning around like the girl in “The Exorcist” when the term was thrown out there. Even many doctors are ill-equipped to diagnose or understand the make-up of AS. But this guy was a pro.

And who could blame anyone for being in the dark on this subject? AS was not officially on the radar screen medically, until 1997, even though it had been researched and written about since the mid 1940’s. The doctor whose name it bears, has long since gone on to that big laboratory in the sky, but the secular community is just now hearing about it, and many are still trying to figure out where it fits on the Autism spectrum. Don’t look at me, I only work here.

Anyway, it is refreshing to meet new people all the time, who have been diagnosed with AS, or have someone in their family who they’re wondering about. It’s not like finally being able to pigeon-hole crazy uncle Harry, or anything like that. Most often, a correct diagnosis is more help to the parents of a small child who seems to have some sort of learning impairment; something out of the ordinary about them that is baffling, but they just can’t quite put their finger on it. A correct diagnosis equips parents, teachers, and even friends with better tools to deal with and understand the actions and needs of that child.

Left to themselves, most of these kids would manage to make it through life, hurtling obstacles and impediments on their own, but it’s oh so nice to have the village standing with you, rather than chasing you down the street with pitchforks and firebrands. Yes, AS-ers are a breed apart. Like someone from another planet, they process things differently than most earthlings; some things they are unable to process at all. They’re not super heroes with extraordinary powers, but on the whole, they are able to leap tall buildings after many arduous attempts; bend steel with a clever machine that they devised in their garage last night; and work faster than a speeding bullet on things that interest them. And when it comes to determination, they can be more powerful than a locomotive. On the other hand (and keeping with the super hero theme) they can be as annoying as Kryptonite, driving those closest to them crazy, with their unearthly ways. And that’s where a growing awareness and understanding of Asperger Syndrome really pays off for the Kent families of the world.

I was not fortunate enough to come along at a time when Asperger Syndrome was known and understood. Therefore, in a cookie-cutter school system, I was categorized early on, as slow. Now anyone who knows me, will testify that I am anything but slow, unless we’re taking about running. When it comes to most subjects that I excel in, I am as fast as anyone ever was. Accurate? Now that’s another subject. For instance: while typing, I can misspell more words in a minute than anyone in the tri-state area. Little words, big words, you name it. I almost never type the word “what” correctly. How does one always manage to get the simplest words wrong? And big words, don’t even get me started. I know a vast array of verbal barbs, but how to spell them is a mystery to me, even if I have seen them a thousand times. If it weren’t for that little red line that appears under a word when it’s suspect, my readers would probably be wondering what language I’m trying to communicate in. “Abner! He’s at it again! He’s making up a new language!”

Anyway, like I said in the beginning, it’s refreshing to mention Asperger Syndrome to someone in the public sector, and have them respond in an understanding and helpful way. I shutter to think how many of my bosses over the years were left dumbfounded at some of my bloopers, and eccentric ways. If you’ve just discovered that you have AS, if someone in your family has it, or you have a friend who is Aspergerific (spell-check be damned), then I hope you will find my blog not only informative, humorous, and incredibly charming, but that you will find it comforting as well.

And to all my AS friends, until next time… keep acting like you’re smiling, because I know inside, you really are..

At some time in their life, everyone has probably pulled a practical joke. You know what I mean: You come running into a crowded theater and shout FIRE. What a laugh to watch the panicked crowd scramble for the exits in the darkness, bumping into chairs and spilling popcorn all over the place. But you see, the joke is, that there is no fire. It was all just a hilarious hoax. ha ha ha. Well, if you haven’t figured it out by now, that’s really not a very “practical” thing to do. In fact, it’s so impractical that it’s against the law.

Maybe it’s because I have Asperger Syndrome and I’m simply oblivious to the outcome of certain events, that I have been the architect and instigator of many an impractical joke. It’s just true that things can seem so funny when you’re planning them, but in the aftermath, you realize that maybe, just maybe, it’s not as funny as it looked on paper. I’ll supply you here with three examples (as I have heard it said that three points to a sermon is the limit).

When I was in high school, my sense of humor was developing at a rapid pace. I was reading Mad Magazine, a lot, which gave me insights into the world of sarcasm and parody. During a lunch hour break, I and a friend of mine decided to use the blackboard in our next class to do a comical expose on the last days of Hitler’s Germany. We had funny items such as, a poster featuring a fire sale at Josef Goebble’s furniture store, where slightly singed lampshades made of genuine human skin were being sold at bargain basement prices: “Everything must go.” By the time the teacher arrived, we had filled the board with a whole cadre of hilarious articles and pictures that would make a Bavarian sheep herder laugh his ass off. Unfortunately, our English teacher wasn’t a Bavarian sheep herder. Turned out Mrs. Anderson was a blonde, blue-eyed woman, of Hebrew descent. Who knew? To say the least, she was not impressed with our clever wit, and we were duly embarrassed. In English class that day, we learned a new word: Mortified.

Another example was when I was living in Washington State (as an adult husband, and father of two children). In our office, there were a couple of girls who liked to go to the tanning salon during their lunch break (we seem to have a lunch break theme going here). Every day, without fail, they were at the salon. Now in Washington State, you don’t get much actual sunlight, even in the summer, so if you want a tan, that’s just about the only way to achieve one. It occurred to me that it might be funny to pull a little joke on these two bronzing beauties. I went to their tanning salon and got something with the company logo, took it back to my office, and constructed supposed letters describing a faulty lamp which caused skin cancer: Serial number for the lamp in question, a disclaimer for any illness or death as a result of its use, and a free visit to a cancer specialist, were all laid out in the most believable fashion. Duly canceled stamps were placed on official-looking envelopes, and placed in their mail baskets. What a laugh it would be to see their faces when they discovered that they might have cancer. It was my intention to be there with a few informed friends when the letters were opened, to ask what was wrong, and then laugh like there was no tomorrow. But, like many well-meaning gestures of endearment, things don’t always go as you plan. Arriving late at the scene, the girls had been given too much time to digest the news. So, after a few angry tears and a sound scolding for literally scaring the tan right off their bodies, life at the office went back to its usual slump.

My final example (and there are many more, trust me), is again one that happened while I was in high school. And, as my stream of consciousness carries me from one related subject to another in a non-sequitur way, this story involves both a letter and the threat of fatal illness, but no lunch hour break.

At the time, I was reading a novel titled “The Caine Mutiny.” In the book, a young man was going to war on a battle ship. His father hands him a letter just before departure, instructing him not to read it until the boat has sailed. In the letter, the father describes a fatal illness from which he is suffering, and that by the time the young man returns from the tour, his father would be dead. I got a grand idea that this would be a funny gag to pull on someone if it were just a joke. I had a friend who was going with a girl at the time, and I suggested that perhaps we could construct a “note” from him to her, using the basic same words as the novel letter, but changing it up a bit, suggesting that they should break up because he was going to die of some rare disease. He would pass this note to her between classes, instructing her not to read it until just before the hour was up, at which time we would all meet back at his locker, reveal that it was a joke, and all have a great laugh. Seems reasonable, no?

It would have worked better if she had followed the instructions, but she did not. She read the note immediately, giving her a whole hour to cry her teen-angel eyes out during biology. When we met up again between classes, the halls were teaming with carefree students going to their next class; that is, with the exception of one very upset girl who was at one moment beyond consolation in grief, and the next, enraged with a wrath that I had never before seen in a woman. My partner in crime lost his girlfriend over that one, and if I hadn’t been swifter, I might have lost something vital myself.

I don’t do that kind of stuff any more. Too many close calls have retired me from faking parking tickets that almost get paid, or posing as someone from the IRS. There’s just too much risk involved: Like the guy whose friends make him think he’s just won the Lottery. When he finds out it’s was all a joke, he may just want to kill himself, or someone close. What is a Practical joke, anyway? I’m pretty sure I don’t know.

Often, there is no explanation for what happens in life, so we search for something to explain the unexplainable. Like when you sprain your ankle. If you’re a relatively good person, you say that it must be some evil force bearing down on your soul to discourage you. If you have not lived your life so honorably, you may think that it is the forces of good punishing you for not living right. The exact same happenstance produces completely opposite scenario’s for two persons who find themselves limping around for a couple of weeks. One blames the devil, while the other blames God. Of course, there are those who think they are above all forces both good and evil, or that perhaps no ultimate good or evil exists at all. Those people sprain their ankles, too. They don’t believe that anything extraordinary causes it. Things just happen.

Although I am someone who believes in ultimate good and evil, in most cases, I believe that things both good and bad, simply “happen.” A dishonest rich man may have three sailing yachts, five villa’s, and a hundred cars, while a very good and honorable person may live in humble, if not deplorable circumstances, without a pot to sail a toy boat in, or a clunker to trade in for government cash. There is no cosmic explanation why there is such a disparaging amount of distance between these two. Both simply exist in an imperfect world filled with dangerous toys and violent forces. Many hard working, God loving,  honest-as-the-day-is-long people die young, and leave this world with hardly a trace that they ever existed. Then there are those, like Pharaohs of the past, who build edifices to themselves at the cost of millions of lives, and they are talked about, investigated and fawned over, some three and four thousand years after their shriveled up, despicable little carcasses are nothing more than a coffin full of nasty, decaying beef jerky.

Everyone is looking for justice. Where is justice? In this world, you have a better chance of finding Waldo in the throng of millions circling around the Ka’ba in Mecca. The fact is, there is little justice in this world. Good people go to prison for doing nothing wrong at all, while the guilty are free to perpetrate their horrible deeds upon the innocent until the day they die from natural causes. I’m sure that many who suffered in the concentration camps of the Third Reich wondered what they had done to deserve the horrors they were put through. Small children with wondering eyes, who had never stolen as much as a cookie in their short lives, ripped from their parents arms, and forced to do unspeakable things before they were cast aside as so much worthless cord wood.

Oh, I know what some of you are thinking. If a person has faith in God, they will rise out of their circumstances and life will turn out peachy in the end. While this is true in many instances, it is not a paradigm. Bad, really bad things, do happen to good, really good people. If a family is all destroyed in a tornado, save one small child, we accept it as a miracle, and count our blessings. But the truth of the situation from where the child sits is that their mother, father and siblings were brutally murdered by the storm.

I love taking the high road. I love thanking God for all things, but truthfully, some things are difficult to thank God for. Because they are BAD things. Finding the good that can come from bad. That is a very positive way to approach life. But it is not always an easy one. Like it or not, after bad things happen, someone is usually left with the task of having to move the rubble and dispose of the dead bodies. One little trip to Haiti would convince anyone, that bad things happen to very dear people, and worse things happen if there is no relief available. We who survive the horrible things that happen around us, must go on despite the tears in our eyes, that lump in our throat, and the unbearable aching in our heart, to assist others in groping their way out from under the gross darkness of despair.

This does not mean that we all should jump on a plane to Haiti, or wherever the next disaster strikes. There is plenty of despair right here, all around us, wherever we may live, to deal with every day. If our eyes and our hearts are open, we may catch someone before they fall; or we may come in to comfort and aid those suffering after it is too late to avert their trouble. Or we may be called upon to pick up the pieces left behind of shattered lives who, right now, need a helping hand, an encouraging word, and a prayer.

I will reluctantly allow others to pontificate why both good and bad things happen in this world. The good doctor does not care to criticize what has brought a bleeding victim into his office. He or she simply gets to the task of making a bad situation, better. Warnings and preparations to prevent bad things from happening are always wise and desirable, but bad things will happen to all of us at various times in life, no matter how carefully we may work to avoid them. And it is in those times, that we find out how truly bad, bad can be, and how truly good, good is.

When you’re a little kid, you often find yourself a pest to those around you. In my case, it was my brother. He was five years older than I, separated by a sister who had been born previous to my arrival. Now, imagine a family with three bedrooms, four kids, boy, girl, boy, girl. That meant, my older sister shared her bedroom with our little sister (seven years apart), and my brother shared his bedroom with me. I can only imagine what suffering my brother went through during his identity discovering years, with a nose-full-of-snot kid constantly dogging up his business. And the extent of which I could do that is on a grand scale, believe me. By the time he was a teenager, he was going to have to leave home or commit suicide. And don’t think I wasn’t a great contributor to that  psychotic dilemma. All I can say is, thank goodness he left home.

Now flash forward some fifty years or so, and put yourself in my wife’s shoes for a moment. Here she is, a full-grown adult, having to share a room, a house, a world with that little pest of a kid. For, in so many ways, I am still an adolescent child, who can be constantly annoying when taken in large doses. Now in the wonderful community of Christian faith, my wife is a saint , but she has not received her glorified body yet, and on that level, she is subject to pain, and like a constant dripping can drive a sane person mad, I can be a major contributor to her mental and emotional well being, or lack thereof.

When we first met, my wife considered me a most persistent man. In fact, she will tell you, if it hadn’t been for my persistence, we never would have wound up together. We met, I was impressed. Her, not so much. She walked away, I followed. She ran, I ran too. She went to Bolivia, changed her name, and… well, she didn’t go that far, but you get the picture. I dogged her as much as I ever dogged my brother back in the old days, until she just had to sign up for the e-ticket on the roller coaster that is my life, or leave the park altogether. Luckily for me, she hopped on, and we’ve been riding together ever since.

But, there came a time, early on in our new and amazing journey into marital bliss, when she began to wonder what she had signed up for. A potential love can be a great person to see and be with on those exciting things called “dates,” but when you actually begin to see them constantly, every day, rain or shine, under every conceivable circumstance known to man, the bloom can swiftly fade on those roses he picked for you from the neighbor’s yard. In fact, we weren’t far into our marriage before she was confident that I was put on this earth to drive her stark raving mad. We had totally different ways of thinking and processing things. My brain was not just that of a man (which can be perplexing enough for a woman, on it’s own), but there was something more. Something strangely different about me. Something she had not identified before in any other man. Something that threatened to undermine our relationship. It might take a clinical psychologist years, to discover what the intimacy of marriage was able to bring to the surface very quickly.

Due to her tenacity and research, she got the inkling that something neurological might be standing between us. And through some extensive research, she believed that it might have a name: Asperger Syndrome. Now, not only was this a new and misunderstood term in the medical community, the public had virtually not heard of it at all up until that point. Then, along came a TV show that had a quirky fellow who was portrayed as having AS. But mostly, it seemed like a gimmick for something more like Tourette’s Syndrome than anything else. So when my wife suggested that we look into AS as a possible explanation for our differences, I was not sure that I hadn’t pushed her over the edge at last.

But, she pointed me to some research online, and bought a few books on the subject. We read them together, and I was astounded to find that I was not just some quirky guy out here in the world, all alone, with my quirkiness. I was one of thousands who actually process information differently. And there were marked characteristics that indicated, and explained much of what had been a mystery to me for most of my life. It opened my eyes to so much about myself that I had taken for granted, and explained many difficulties I had faced from my earliest recollections, on into adulthood. Difficulties that I had never dared to share with others. Gaps that scared me, perplexed me, and often left me confused and disoriented, in a world where it seemed everyone else “got it.”

I had literally lived 57 years of life without realizing how drastically different I was, and that there was a logical reason for that difference. Even before I was diagnosed with AS, my wife and I were convinced beyond a shadow of doubt that I was a high functioning Asperger Syndrome child. This meant that I was low on the spectrum, but that is true of many who labor with the effects of AS. We can walk in the world, function on many levels adequately, and some levels extraordinarily perhaps, and no one would pick us out of the crowd as anything but a bit eccentric.

So what’s the fuss? Who gives a rats ass? Well, for my wife and I, it has been a blessing beyond compare. AS is like a strange and frightening sound in the night: If you don’t know what’s making the sound, you can conjure up all kinds of fantastic ideas of what it might be. It can make you lay awake, shivering under your covers, afraid to stick your foot out over the edge of the bed. Afraid that the boogie man is trying to scale the walls of your house, and break in through your window, while all along, it is just the sound of the wind in the trees.

For us, discovering that I have Asperger Syndrome literally saved our marriage, my wife’s sanity, and gave me something to do every Thursday (writing this blog). What a relief it is for me to know that on a daily basis, my wife can identify my gaps in thinking, etc., and help make up for them without my feeling inadequate as a man, or her feeling put upon as my spouse. Out of this, has grown a love for one another that simply did not exist before we grappled with this issue. I have never felt more understood and appreciated than I do right now, and my wife has risen to the occasion with the utmost devotion and understanding. We laugh about things that used to drive us both crazy. Rather than being at odds, we are a team, equipped with a knowledge that lessens the friction between our worlds, and allows us a closeness that we would never have been able to achieve otherwise. Anyway, that’s our story. What’s yours?

I have a favorite song that I’d like to share with all my readers right now. It’s taken from the movie “Moulin Rouge.” It’s titled “Come What May,” and says just about everything I would like to say to my lovely wife Rhandi, for now and always. This one’s for you Baby. You’re da greatest.

One day, when my kids were younger, I tuned into a children’s show on television just to see what it had to offer. It was a simple little program, made for a very young audience. But of late, it had fallen into controversy. Somebody who was very concerned about the subliminal indoctrination of our children, had criticized it for promoting homosexuality. It seems one of the characters (whether boy, or girl, was never clear), carried a purse. Well, that was enough to boycott their sponsors, or the station that allowed such blatant displays of impropriety. But I had another idea. I would check it out myself. And so I did.

While it seemed to smack of Communism, to me, I did not see anything in it that appeared to promote cross-dressing or sexual deviance. In fact, I found myself somewhat taken by the whole format, aside from the Marxist thing. The key element was that it was built for babies. My kids were too old at that time to be interested in such pablum, but I found it utterly fascinating. In fact, I was struck at one point with the cleverness of it. These genderless creatures had TV screens on their tummies. And every week, one of them would show a little filmed story, right there on their belly. For instance: very small children going to the petting zoo. Now what hit me as genius was that when the film was over, one of the characters wanted to see it again. And much to my surprise, they showed the whole thing all over.

Well, this week, I’m presenting a rerun of a blog I wrote last year. It’s one of my favorites, and my wife got a real kick out of it the first time around, so just in case you have the mentality of a two year old, and love repetition as much as I do, here is…

I’m Not Sure If You’re Interested, But That Never Stopped Me Before…

I don’t know when it happened, or how old I may have been when I discovered that I was capable of being a bore, but whenever it was, on that day, I probably learned for the first time what it felt like to be embarrassed. For me, nothing creeps up more subtly, or takes over more completely than my non-stop enthusiasm for subjects in which I take delight.

Asperger Syndrome assumes many shapes and textures, but for me, none is more pronounced and frequently evident, than the penchant to speak with lengthy abandon about anything I find intriguing.

Just ask those on Facebook. What a gold-mine opportunity for me to reconnect with old friends, and interject my laborious thoughts into every topic they post that happens to tweak my interest. Did I say old friends? Perhaps I should say, fresh audience. Just when they thought they’d moved far enough away, and allowed enough time to lapse so that they could get on with their lives, there I was, asking to be their “Friend” again.  But one good thing has come of it: this vast pool of new cyber-victims has afforded my wife a slight respite from being the only ear in the house I bend.

If you are not familiar with Facebook, it’s a social network, where people daily post their thoughts or activities. Some are as trivial as “I’m pouring my first cup of coffee this morning, and getting a perverse sense of joy out of letting the whole world know about it,” or, “My fingers are bloody from typing every little detail of my life onto Facebook, so I’m going to bed” (post time: 3 am). Others are more thought provoking. And that’s what I’m angling for.

With the fervor of a tent preacher, I begin to interject my views on a given subject of interest, let’s say “Should the Aboriginal People of the Amazon be forced to wear clothes?” By the time I’m done typing, only the faint-of-heart are still enfranchised enough to give a darn. And it is only then that I become completely embarrassed to realize that I have once again commandeered and dominated the conversation.

It happens all the time. A while back, I ran into an old friend I hadn’t seen in years and we made a date to meet for lunch. Over heaping mounds of Asian food, I found myself talking non-stop for the entire hour. Wherever that friend is today, I would sincerely like to apologize. He’s not returning my calls.

Now you’d think that I would enjoy a good listener, but in reality, if one isn’t willing to engage in the conversation, if their eyes glaze over with a salty film, if they seem to be losing the function of the left side of their face, I am not a happy camper. Sure, I’ll plow on alone until I have so thoroughly exhausted them, the EMT will have to certify that no more can be done for the patient, and take them off of life support, but afterwards I will feel a most profound sense of remorse.

No matter how many times in my life this scenario plays out, it is generally not until after I have made a total nuisance of myself, that I realize I have run severely overtime at the dais. By that time, my audience (small as it may be) has taken up origami out of shear boredom, and having used up all existing inventory, are in the process of striping the walls of paper. Even this blog is a great example of how I find it difficult to put the brakes on a subject once I get started. Most blogs are of a moderate length, so as not to discourage readers whose attention span is the duration of an egg-timer. But my posts are always longer than they should be. And that, after I have trimmed them down from morbid obesity. And it should be noted, that at the beginning of each writing, I am determined to make this one short.

A little word of caution for those of you who might accidentally stumble into my web: If you are in my presence, the warning signs are evident. My seemingly unresponsive, monotonous voice will suddenly perk up. I will actually begin to seem engaged. My demure eyes will sparkle like the old-timer from the movie “Treasure of the Sierra Madre” who spontaneously breaks into a jig when they strike it rich. From there, it’s all downhill. Gravity has taken hold of the conversation, and the G-force will increase until the very skin on your face is stretched to its limit.

It’s more difficult to figure this out on the computer. Tell-tale signs are that within a given paragraph, I will have utilized the equivalent of three quarters of the English dictionary, and made up a couple of words along the way which will be impossible to decipher. I will have used at least three illustrations to make each point, and will not be satisfied until I have once again broken my own record for incorporating the comma in a sentence.

And now, for your further enjoyment, I have included a clip from the movie, “The Treasure of the Sierra Madre.” It’s the moment when the old prospector informs his companions that they are standing on a rich vein of gold. If I could have located the whole clip, you’d see that he was quite a talker, as well as an interpretive dancer. Until next time…

Next week on glitchbucket.com: Come What May 

Pretty much everyone these days knows what the term Bucket List means. But for the four people who don’t, it’s a list of things one would like to do before they kick the proverbial “Bucket.” Where’d the term come from? I don’t know. Maybe it was a farm term; You know: Gramps was out milking the cow when suddenly, he “kicked the bucket.”

I’ll never forget watching the movie, “It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World” in Cinerama (three screen wrap around) as a kid, when the character played by Jimmy Durante actually kicked a bucket down the hillside when he died. That day, I learned that subtle humor can often be literal. Or was it, literal humor can often be subtle? My head is starting to hurt, so perhaps I should get on with the point of this blog before the few of you who are still reading, don’t begin to wish I’d just kick the bucket and get it over with already.

I have a list. But it’s not just a “Bucket List,” it’s a “Glitchbucket List.” My own Asperger Syndrome version of things I’d like to do just once before I die. Like anyone who has difficulty doing certain things in life (this exempts a couple of guys and a gal I know), they may often wish that just once, they could do that thing with ease, if at all. The guy who is bound in a wheelchair might wish that he could stand on his own. The guy with arthritis might wish that he could walk down the road with ease. The guy who can walk might wish he could run. The guy who can run might wish that someday he’d be able to get one of those motorized wheelchairs. It’s a vicious cycle.

Most of us realize that we only have a little time on this earth, and then it’s over. If we fail to do something that we intended to do, or if we are unable to achieve a certain goal, we will eventually have to say goodbye to those lofty aspirations. As someone who has dealt with the difficulties of Asperger Syndrome for 60 years, there are a few Aspergerations I’d like to aspire to before I die. Many things I have mastered, many things I have done, and I am truly blessed with so much to be thankful for, but now and again, we all wish for more, and I’m no exception. These are simple requests. Nothing as dramatic as visiting the Great Wall of China. And nothing as impossible as flying to the moon; as lofty as curing cancer or bringing world peace. Just some everyday things that some people don’t struggle with. No big whoop for many Neurotypicals, but we all have our crosses to bear. Anyway, for what it’s worth…

Here is my “Glitchbucket List”:

• To curb an obsessive jag before it mushrooms into the blob that ate New York City.
• Once, just once, I wish I could remember someone’s name without having to  hear it seven times.
•  Be able to take a test, or fill out a form without becoming nauseous from vertigo.
• I’d like to have the kind of Asperger Syndrome that makes you really smart.
• I wish I could crack up someone with my sense of humor, half as much as I crack myself up.
• Stand in front of a drug store shelf full of cold medicines and actually find what I’m looking for before I’m cured by natural remission.
• Retain the slightest bit of information about something that does not knock me over with interest.
• Give myself and others just one option.
• Change your mind without having to get all up in your face.
• Change my mind without having to get all up in my face.
• Learn to do anything the easy way after learning to do it the hard way first.

 As you may have noticed, I have exceeded the ten items that the title promised. And as this list could go on and on but for the constraint of something more external than my sense of constraint, last but not least…

• Stop talking about any subject before I have completely exhausted both the topic and the listener.

Next week on glitchbucket.com: A blog revisited

This week’s title almost sounds like the opening line to a rousing Pub song. And if you’re holding a drink in your hand right now (even if it’s a glass of Alka-Seltzer Plus), raise it with me, as I toast those pioneer parents who are cautiously steering their families through Aspergerland. I say pioneers, because those rearing a child with Asperger Syndrome have probably never faced anything like this before. They are thrashing their way through forests, up and down canyons, across deserts, and through hostile territory, for the very first time, without the benefit of a map. And they will likely never pass this way again.

Unlike many parents, who, after throwing a few whelps, have got the process down, the parents of an Asperger child have freshly fallen down the rabbit hole, no matter how many children they’ve dealt with up till now. A seasoned parent is much more relaxed and care-free by the time they reach number three or four; ie: With the first kid, they think they’re going to snap his neck when they pick him up. Now they know (from even the second one on) that you can throw them over your shoulder like a sack of potatoes, and their necks will not break 97.8% of the time. As the third of four children, I can tell you, my brother, the oldest among us, was not given a long leash when it came to driving (which was probably a good thing). A few years later with my sister, our parents were a bit more liberal on the subject. By the time my turn came around, they were passively disinterested. And when my younger sister got her license, they were handing out cars and throwing confetti like she’d won the “home viewer’s showcase” on The Price Is Right.

Many families experiencing Asperger Syndrome, have only one child with AS. The remaining siblings (if there are any) may have plenty of problems to deal with, but you can just about bet that one of them is not a compulsive tendency to line their socks up in a row, all facing the same direction like well-trained soldiers, color coordinated by Blackwell of Mars. If the parents of an AS child are lucky enough to procure a clear diagnosis, they will likely have only this one opportunity to get it right. Oops, there goes years three, four and five. What’s done is done. If there are moments, months, years of misunderstandings and incorrect responses to the unique needs of that child, due to a lack of diagnosis, mis-diagnosis, or something else, it’s all water under the bridge. Now, try dealing with that for 57 years, like I did.

You’ve got to admire those people who trail-blaze. Those who, like Captain Kirk on Star Trek used to say, they were on a mission “… to boldly go where no man has gone before.” Never mind the split infinitive. This statement says it all.

So today, I am saluting the parents of Asperger Syndrome children, wherever they are. And now, I’m going to make it personal: That’s right, I’m talking to you. Your compassion, perseverance, and understanding are appreciated. One particular parent I’ve had the privilege of getting to know recently is a young mother of four. Her name is Tessa. Tessa has a blog. It’s called “Apples and Autobots,” and it’s all about the wild and crazy ride she finds herself on each week with her kids, one of which has Asperger Syndrome. She calls him “Bot” in the blog, and if you go there, you will read about Bot, his Nuerotypical twin sister, “Princess,“ and his two other siblings, “Tinkerbell”, and “Tug.” Check it out, and tell her I sent you. Until next week, sleep tight, and don’t let the bed bugs hold a card game in the kitchen, and smoke all your cigars, and drink all the wine, and rearrange the furniture, and…

Next week on glitchbucket.com: My glitchbucket list: or, ten things I’d like to see happen just once before I die.

Sometimes Asperger Syndrome is funny. Sometimes it’s not. Parents who have children with AS know what I’m talking about. There are things that are so cute and unexpected, you find yourself thinking: Isn’t that just adorable. Then there are other times when you think: It’s a major chore keeping up with the off-the-wall actions and attitudes of a child who is trying their darndest to navigate through a world where everyone else is speaking a language that they may never fully master.

When a puppy arrives, it is so cute when they crouch down and bark like a little squeak toy being attacked by the big bad human. “Hey honey, you’ve got to come in here and see this. Come on little fella, do it again for mommy.” But when those little balls of fur grow up to bark their heads off at anything that moves, they can be the most annoying beasts on earth. So it can be with any amusement. Many people love to ride on roller coasters, but few would consider it Nirvana, to be stuck on one forever.

And that’s sort of what it can be like, living with someone who has Asperger Syndrome; a daily roller coaster ride, where the bar is stuck in lock position, and you keep passing the off ramp like it’s not even there. Just ask my wife. She’s sitting in the living room, minding her own business, when in walks this serious looking guy in a cheap suite, holding a lit cigarette, saying something like this: “Submitted for your approval: A normal American housewife, whose husband is a bit on the quirky side. When they first met, she didn’t know what to think of him. She was intrigued. Confused. But then she fell in love with this mysterious man. And eventually, they married. She had no way of knowing it at the time, but she had just enrolled herself in a school we like to call, The Twilight Zone.”

Parents of small children with AS sometimes worry that their son or daughter will not work well with others, fit in with the crowd, or survive Kindergarten. As there are varying degrees of severity affecting those with Asperger Syndrome, there is no paradigm, but it is safe to say that most kids with AS do rather well in the world, and often quite successfully so. I can tell you from personal experience that it really helps when you marry someone who both understands and is able to compliment those areas in your life that are lacking.

We often joke that my wife is a right brain person, and I’m a left brain person, and that together we have one brain, but that is not entirely true. I’m sort of a left brain 75%er, and a right brain 10%er, which, if you do the math, leaves a little to be desired on both sides. So my wife has to make up for the deficit. But I’ve learned over the years to fake it enormously, and am still waiting to receive my honorary Oscar for lifetime achievement.

A fellow who manages maintenance for a large complex was telling me the other day that he has some trouble with workers whose first language is not English. They may be the hardest workers he has, but when given instructions, they often understand only part of what is being said. The rest, they just guess at the meaning. They nod their heads as if they understand, but it may well be that they wind up fixing a lock when they were supposed to be fixing a leak. If you think that’s funny, then you’ve never had a leak that needed to be fixed right now!

My first language is English (in fact, it’s my only language), but I have the same problem that those poor immigrants are having. There are concepts and communications that just fly right over my head. Daily. I wind up guessing at things as much as I’m sure about them. When I get it right, I am so euphoric that I want to rent a billboard and announce it to the world. When I’m wrong, apologies are often in order even if they are not delivered. I think my wife has some on back order right now. But the point is, that I have bluffed my way through adolescence, elementary school, high school, college, adulthood, business, marriage, and parenthood. Now, in the twilight of my life, I am able to sit back and laugh about it. Fortunately, I have a soul mate who finds it amusing (most of the time), and laughs right along with me.

There is so much more I could share on this subject, but I’d probably end up pulling things out of… well, you know where, so I’ll stop before I’m accused of lying. Have a wonderful 4^th of July weekend, and don’t blow your nose off, or anything else for that matter. Here’s a little something for all you wonderful folks who live within 50 feet of anyone with Asperger Syndrome:

Next week on glitchbucket.com: A tribute to my new blog-er friend, Tessa