Category Archives: Living on the Spectrum

Always an adventure-Musical outing with my musician son

Living on the Spectrum

We are in Chelan, Washington… Nick has performances with one of his dear friends from the Washington State School for the Blind, Mac Potts.

A simple car ride became a long struggle, as  the 3 hour trip ( per Google Maps) lasted over 5 hours. Unexpected delays due to construction, horrendous traffic jams on the I-5, necessitated a detour the scenic route, via Stevens Pass.

Needless to say, we arrived a tad behind schedule, and  the motel further complicated our lodging situation. By the time we juggled rooms to get an ADA friendly one… It was almost time to go to his first engagement.

I phoned a local spot, thinking I’d make a quick pass at the highly rated burger place on the main drag in Chelan.

Local and quick were “relative terms”…most all the local eateries are located on Main Street, wedged in between the souvenir shops, winery tasting rooms and other retail places.

Did I mention that it’s high tourist season there?

We’ve ever been to Chelan before. A simple trip to pick up a meal became  a logistical nightmare. I drove around the block twice, to find a handicap spot and hobble over to the restaurant location, accross the street,  on my walking sticks. My only option to pick up our to go order.

Silly me… when I phoned to place my “to go” order thought I was going to go through the drive up window.

In their favor, the young man at the counter took pity on me and  did walk me back out to my car, carrying the food containers, down the block from his establishment. I couldn’t manage my walking sticks and the boxes of food at the same time.

I get Nick situated in the car, with his food. We’re driving to arrive at the gig on time. I made the suggestion he eat his french fries first because the burger was a bit drippy, and he could save that for when we parked the car and unloaded gear rather than getting his clothes for the gig soiled with the juices from his burger.

I glanced over and noticed he’s not eating his food. I repeated my instruction for him to eat the french fries. His response was, I can’t! In the 42 years, I’ve lived with  my kid,  I never realized the hierarchy of  his eating food.

His stepmother, Alice, trained him to eat the entrée first, so that he wouldn’t fill his stomach up with the extras. Ditto his drink .Nick  wasn’t allowed to have so much is a sip until he had finished his main entrée. Wow!

Mark, his father died almost 25 years ago.  Stepmother Alice is long gone and hasn’t been a part of his life since his dad passed. Yet she still exerts more influence on this 42 year old man than me, his mother, sitting right there in the car with him , go figure.

Next day…

More adventures with  Baker and his  autism stuff-  I can’t make this stuff up!

We got into pool/jacuzzi at the motel where we’re staying. Nick wanted to stay in the Jacuzzi while I enjoyed the cool pool adjacent to the tub. I asked him to stay put until I could guide him out, when he was ready to join me in the big pool.

Did he listen to me? Heck no!

Instead he scooted over and got himself caught/sucked into the return slot, located on the side of the tub. He now has a 6“ x 8“ Hicky from the suction on his right butt cheek!

Scared him good too. He feared it was somehow gonna suck them into water trap on the system.

Returned to the room- Nick’s showered and drying off. The next thing I see, is my son with his head angled into the sink.  An attempt to run water into his right ear, which he believed to be clogged with ear wax!

We will be visiting his Ear Nose and Throat doc as soon as we arrive home!

Kathy

Kathy Gail Passage–  Looking for the humor in life situations

follow my blog kathygaillaughingatlife.com

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Some things just never change

Living on the Spectrum, Puppy Posts, Tool Man

For my “long standing readers… this post is a mash up from two different posts, one from almost ten years ago when we first brought home the new pups… https://kathygaillaughingatlife.com/2013/11/21/the-great-elk-hound-escape/

And an incident that involved the batteries in the impossible to reach smoke detectors- which required the Little Giant extension ladder to enable one to reach the unit and swap out batteries. https://kathygaillaughingatlife.com/2014/09/11/little-giant-big-brain/

 

Hubby’s still outsmarted by dogs, ten plus years of chasing after the furry escape artists and they still get the best of him!

Hubby or “Tool Man” as we fondly describe him to folks when sharing tales of his various projects…has been spending many hours renovating the area which exists beneath the deck which travels the entire length of the house. It faces the descending wetlands that encompass the lower end of our ½ acre lot.

He announced last year, after almost ten years of constant vacuuming and hours of testing out carpet stain removal products- that he intended to renovate the “dog area”.

His plan was to eliminate the majority of dirt tracked into the home on the paws of our pets. This involved the delivery of a mountainous pile of gravel delivered to our driveway just as the fall rains kicked in, by the way.

Pea sized gravel and about $800 worth of shade tolerant plants called Japanese Spurge, were eventually installed and through a series of stages that involved sectioning off major areas of the “doggie area”. This part wasn’t a total problem as it concentrated the area where the pooches could poop, and necessitated a frequent clearing of said substances to avoid tracking this unpleasant residue onto the carpet when they bound through the clear vinyl door of the entry and trod on the carpet of the recreation room.

As with many of the projects Hubby has executed over the almost 40 years of our marriage, this one morphed to include an additions:

* Expansion of the wooden deck outside the doorway of the dog’s area.

* Creation of a “shade garden” at the end that abutted our new neighbor’s back yard.

*Renovation (tear down the existing) Hog Wire fence, originally installed during the summer of 2016 when Hubby was in between employers.  He’d noticed the fence line had migrated toward the wetlands, and decided an additional improvement would be to reinforce the fence by anchoring it to a large block of cement to prevent further movement.

 

Many steps of the project left gaps in the fence lines, which provided opportunities for our dogs to escape… visit the neighbors and chase after the rabbits that have populated our community in increasing numbers over the years.

Today’s escape was a replay or rather a mash-up of two of my older posts involving previous incidents recovering canine escapees and the trials of our fire alarm systems.

We were awakened by the shrill shrieks of the unit needing a new battery at 7:00AM.

Nervous Elkhounds expressed their discomfort by pouncing on and off our beds, racing up and down the stairs, announcing the obvious. If they could talk they’d scream “Change those Batteries… NOW!”

Shaking with anxiety our canines were soon joined by our son Nick. His autism makes the tweets unbearable. He voiced what the dogs were unable to express

“Ray! Get the ladder and fix that battery.”

The ladder to which he referred was the “Little Giant” folding step ladder that daunts all who attempt to extend the device to its full 17 foot length to reach the alarm mounted on the ceiling, 20 feet in the air.

This one smoke alarm is the ONLY reason we still have this ladder, a necessary evil.

Hubby hated it the moment he set eyes on it.

Our fearless Tool Man prefers to balance on a chair, a small kitchen stool, or use our ancient aluminum step ladder. A reject, left behind when a neighbor moved, one that would totally flunk any OSHA tests.

Today was the second time he’d needed to mount this multi-stepped behemoth to exchange the tired 7-volt for a new one.  He swore it was “Just a few years ago” that he’d had to scale up to this height. He cursed the “rip-off” on the life of these alkaline bombs…  Shocked upon examination of the exhausted battery- “It expired in 2020!”

 

Meanwhile the dogs powered through the flimsy plastic barriers erected to protect that shade garden that Hubby had yet to complete.

Déjà vu: I’d spotted the dogs in our neighbor’s yard darting back and forth between the sand box and plastic tricycles. They ignored my please to come back and bolted out the other end , unfenced due to the neighbor’s yard project… and ran up the street.

We’d managed to corral the pups, and Hubby uttered aloud “How the heck did they get through that fence?”

Anxious to demonstrate, their paws flew down the stairs and they dashed through the now gaping hole in the erected structure Hubby was so sure would be impregnable… the chase was on a second time.

Finally secured by a closed doggie door, Hubby was hard at work reclosing his now trampled Shade Garden.

Hard not to laugh as I remind Hubby of  the incident where our newly homed pooches jumped over the fencing that had kept our old arthritic Elkhound, Jaeger , secure in the dog area for the remainder of his years at this new home.

Some things just never change…

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The F Word!

Living on the Spectrum

 

My son Nicholas makes most of his income entertaining. He plays piano and accompanies himself. An amazing repitorie is one of the reasons Nick is so popular with his senior audiences. He knows “their songs”.  He is rarely stumped if a member of the audience requests a song. Having a virtualy unlimited roster of tunes parked in his brain, ready to call up and execute on a moments notice is remarkable. I believe this is one of the benefits of his autism, along with perfect pitch and a memory that vivals any search engine.

“Nothings quicker than Nick!” A phrase I heard often from classmates who’d frequently ask Nick for details on various pieces of music, rather than try to “look it up” on the internet.

This summer I am standing in for Nick’s usual support person named Tommy. He’s a great guy and taking Nick out to perform is one of his “day jobs”, but his true passion is his musical career.  He’s a drummer . During the summer Tommy is on tour with his band.

Your’s truly is driving my son, Nick  to his  monthly engagements at various venues. Many of these are at  Senior Assisted Living facilities. I sit by his side while he sings and plays piano for his audience.

Nick’s way of introducing a song is mostly spot on- he incorporates a theme for his set of selections, in an appropriate manner. Most of the time…but sometimes his logic  works differently, the whole process of sharing  information makes sense to him, of course… but the rest of us, well let’s say it can present challenges.

One quirky bit-  his refusal to announce the actual name of the piece of music he’s performing, before he starts playing. I have  endeavored to change his behavoir, but to date have been unsuccessful.

If I happen to be in attendance at one of his senior/assisted living gigs, I’ve been known to shout out the title when he pauses. He doesn’t get mad at me.  He just chuckles, like sons tend to do when their moms do something they don’t exactly like.

Bottom line- my interventions don’t change his behavior or method of announcing at all.

It’s like he wants his audience to guess. I keep reminding him that many of his audiences are comprised of seniors who would love the hint> They want to know …  rather than be confused for the first stanza, and hopefully recognize the piece by name when he starts on the chorus.

Sometimes when his thought process takes a turn away from what most of us would consider the norm… His introduction results can border on being hilarious.

Take a recent performance of Peggy Lee’s iconic song “Fever”.

This was part of his “summer set “for July.

Nick tends to work up a group of songs each month, a set program that he can play at each of the locations, without too much adjustment. Makes sense to me.  Rather than come up with 15 or 20 entirely different playlists,  the repetition helps him time his performance to keep within the 55 minutes he’s allocated.

So summertime means hot weather, and sweat, and feeling, hot hot hot! Nick decided that “Fever”  fit his theme. Instead of introducing it as the  “fever of love”, he opined that  “This is how summer makes him feel.” His phrasing was spot on, right up to the point where he announced- “ This song is about the F word. “

Jaw dropping silence, and shock filled the faces of many in the audience. I must note that being blind,  Nick could not see that reaction.  He simply carried on performing this song.

Dealing with my son in a congenial manner means I must pick my battles, and this clearly was not the hill I needed to die upon. Smiles soon returned to the faces in the audience as they heard the bars of the chorus and recognized an old favorite.

When we returned to the car, I proceeded to explain that using term, “the F word “was not to be repeated. He was mystified.  The song starts with the letter “F”, so what was my problem?  A lengthy discussion about other meanings of the F word ensued.

His response was a typical outburst of “Oh! Oh! Oh!” Followed by lots of arguments about why he should still be able to use this description.  Logic would not easily win the day in this particular situation. After much prodding on my part, he conceeded.

The description  of “Fever” at  Nick’s next performance included a lengithier description of the song’s content, which he described  as Peggy Lee’s , “Iconic tune.”

But…True to form, he still didn’t announce the actual name of the song.

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Interaction

Living on the Spectrum

Hearing is apparently a bit over rated when it comes to enjoying music.

My son Nicholas entertains  members of assisted living communitities as a way to make  income.  He has an encyclopedic repitoire, his brain  full of tunes sure to please folks of all ages.  Rarely does an audience member stump him with a request for a “favorite tune”.

At a recent performance, an apparently “hearing impaired” woman in the audience   strove to enjoy Nick Baker’s recent performance, in her own way.

Nick’s support person Tommy related this to me, and I had to share.

The lady was seated fairly close to the piano, and Tommy observed her touching the side of the instrument. She  rested her cup of punch, so that it touched the piano. She explained to Tommy she could “feel” the music in this manner.

As Nick continued to play, she caught on to the fact that Nick could not see her.

She inquired of Tommy “Is Nick blind?” She’d not seen him enter the room . Not observed him using his long white cane- a dead give away which signaled his lack of sight.

“Yes.”  Tommy exchanged a smile with her and she continued to observe and listen, in her own way, to the performance.

She in no way disturbed Nick as he played; in fact I’m sure he was unaware of her activities at least until conversation with Tommy ensued.

I love that a “deaf” woman found a way to enjoy the performance of a “blind” man.

This is so wonderful and demonstrates our human capacity to reach out and enjoy life, no matter what obstacles might be in the way.

 

 

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Showbound in Seattle

Living on the Spectrum, PMS (and it's not the medical one), , ,

Once again, my hubby and son provide inspiration for my writing…

“Wahoo!” My husband waved his phone as he played aloud the recorded message from his company. They advised workers to stay in place, work from home!

A recent snowstorm blanketed our area with over five inches of snow. Wind pushed frozen precipitation into perilous piles on local roads and obscured lane markers. Traffic was not moving, major highway intersections closed by congestion of cars that, to their detriment braved the elements and blocked ramps.  School had been canceled in most all Greater Seattle area locations.

Not so excited was my son, who’s regularly Monday schedule includes DART bus ride to our local Senior Center. He volunteers his time every Monday from about 10:30 to 1 p.m. Nicholas resides on the autism spectrum. Breaks in his routine and schedule disturb his normal sunny nature.

I was ambivalent, not going to interrupt my Monday schedule too much. I’d lace up my seldom worn Eddie Bauer snow boots, and take the dogs for a stroll in the snow. They have been excited since the first few flakes hit the wooden slats on the deck. They cavorted and raced about, rooted in drifts of snow, tails wagged in unison.

I put on a pot of tea, intent on a leisurely read of the Sunday paper. My reverie interrupted by a loud sigh, I hear footsteps. My husband trudged up the stairs, into the kitchen and yanked open the door to the refrigerator.

“I’m not hungry” he said as he glanced over his shoulder at me.

Rather than engage with his co-workers on the current project at work, it appeared his more immediate task involved an inventory:  the contents of our pantry.

“Working from home sure makes me hungry.” I offered no comment, and he continued his search.

Jubilation over the snow day faded… He’d grasped the facts- a trip to his favorite Pho restaurant- not in the cards.

The return trip down the stairs is short lived. Five minutes he reappeared in the kitchen. “I don’t think anyone is working! No one is returning messages or responding to my email.”

I raised my eyebrows, “Problems with the VPN connection?”

A bit distracted too, I’d busied myself with set up of our hummingbird feeding station. I‘d returned to the kitchen after a computer search confirmed the recipe and correct ratio of sugar to water. I stirred the bubbling liquid on the stove top.

“No.” He opens a cupboard again and I heard the rustle of packages. “Do you have a plan for lunch?”

“There are lots of leftovers.”  But my comment doesn’t seem to satisfy.

I raise my voice over the noise from the shelves, “there are several bowls of instant ramen noodles and mix, up there on the top left side.”

“We could always make cheese crisps or nachos with beans and cheese…”

He frowns. “Remember, I’ve decided to give up cheese. ” His recent decision, to decrease dairy products in his diet, is at odds with his desire to dine at the present moment, given the limited supplies in our pantry.

I pointed out the tofu stir-fry leftovers, made suggestions of items he could add, like the heat and serve rice packets on the second shelf. “This doesn’t look like very much.”

I rose and returned to my computer, at the other end of the house. From my desk I hear the beep of the microwave timer and the sound of steps going down the stairs.

I started to type but startled as a voice asks ” There bacon in this potato salad?”

My husband discovered on yet another return trip to the kitchen, a container, on the top shelf of the refrigerator toward the back. The clear plastic revealed bacon and blue cheese potato salad.

“Yep,” I confirm, “there’s bacon in that batch.”

His next question “How long has this been in here?” elicits a chuckle. He HAS been gone about 5 days… but really?

“Isn’t there a date on the container label?” I knew the answer. Our local Health Food Cooperative includes this information on each printout, along with the weight and the unit price.  I encouraged him to “read the label.” I turned to the Quick Books inventory I’d begun.

Moments later my son Nick climbed the stairs to the main level and announced he’d chosen to exercise.

“Great.” I’m glad he’s not focused on food just yet. Maybe, I could finish the task at hand before the lunch hour begins.

He filled his water bottle and returned downstairs to the rec- room. A lively disco beat floated up the stairs. I heard the door to my husband’s home office slam.

Over the loud beat pulsing from the stereo speakers, I heard my son Nick shout “number two.”His routine for home workouts entailed furious pedaling on the Air dyne bike, or  vigorous rowing on our Concept Two apparatus. His workout is timed. Ten songs total about thirty minutes, an easy way for my sightless son to keep track.

My husband is back upstairs, again. I fight to keep the smile off my face. “You and Nick are  getting quite a workout this morning.”

My husband gave voice to his frustrations with his co-worker. “Our boss mucked up the process and slowed everyone down.” I made eye contact, gave a look of sympathy and rotated the office chair back toward my computer monitor.

“Number eight!”  My son’s announcement indicates the inevitable-two more songs and he he’d be upstairs expecting lunch.

The music ceased, but is replaced the drone of a Dyson vacuum cleaner. Consumed by nervous energy, my husband vacuumed the entire lower level of the house.

“OK, count your blessings.” I murmured to myself. I pulled up the online schedule that indicates when our neighborhood’s streets will be plowed clear.

“Do we need anything from the store?” Hopeful eyes indicated a desire to don outdoor gear and trudge down to the corner market.  I grabbed a pen…

 

 

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Christmas Came Early.

Chicken Soup for the Soul, Flights of Imagination, Living on the Spectrum, , , , ,

Christmas came early for me this year.  It is always a thrill when I receive an email from the editors at Chicken Soup for the Soul that states an essay I’ve written and submitted  will be included in a new book.

My essay, called Community Spirit,  is very special as it involves my son, Nick Baker. Nick’s love of music, especially Christmas tunes, gave impetus to the tale of how we’ve come to attend a Seattle area event, Great Figgy Pudding Caroling Competition, as the annual launch of our holidays each year. This year we celebrate twenty years of attendance.

The folks at the Pike Market Senior Center, the beneficiary of funds raised at the Caroling Competition,  share my enthusiasm. I have been invited to sign copies of this Christmas volume and proceeds on sales of the book will be added to their coffers that evening.

My essay is one of 101 and each will bring joy to the hearts of readers.   I hope you all enjoy it too.

Christmas came early
Christmas came early
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Little Giant, Big Brain

Living on the Spectrum, , ,

I have been in deep weeds this summer helping my son Nick Baker finish up a book called “Turtle.” It is Nick’s story of being made fun of by kids in his grade school. Nick was so different from the rest of children at his grade school and 25 years ago he was truly a novelty on campus. Using using a long white cane to find his way earned him the nickname “Turtle”.  This is an illustrated book. Nick is both blind and on the Autism spectrum. He truly needed my eyes and editorial skills to help complete his book.

cover with text

Great news! The book is finished and is selling well. We have it uploaded to Amazon for sale as both print book and Kindle EBook. Local press has been kind to Nick. A recent feature on My Edmonds News TV garnered the attention of the local NBC affiliate, KING 5. They sent a reported and cameraman out and did an in-depth interview. The show was to air the next day.

 

My son set his alarm for 5:00 am, the stated beginning time for the King5 morning news broadcast. He promised to keep the volume low, knowing that Mom and Dad’ alarm would remain at the usual 7:00 am rising time.

 

True to his word, we didn’t hear a peep. By 7:00 am our bedroom TV set tuned into the King 5 morning show. Excitedly watching for the next part of the segment that featured Nick, I shouted; “He’s on now!” My husband was in the shower. Steam blew out from the bathroom as he leaped out, towel in hand, to get a look at our family celebrity.

We have ultra sensitive smoke detectors in our home. The weirdest things will get them going… like steam from a hot shower. Yes, they all went off. The units must all belong to the same “union”, when one goes off, they all follow suit and start emitting obnoxious beeps!

Instead of seeing my son on TV, we were running around swinging doors, turning on fans; doing whatever we perceived would make the noise cease and desist. Nick raced up the stairs to see what was happening. He started shouting “I’m going to call 9-1-1”…which of course was not the best idea. Our two dogs were affected by this shrill noise too.  They barked in tandem with Nick. Their voices added to the pleas for the pandemonium to cease.

 

I stopped dead in my tracks.  As calmly as possible given the uproar in our home, I reviewed with Nick the circumstances under which it was permissible to call 9-1-1. He agreed that he did not smell smoke, or feel any heat from a possible fire. Most importantly there were two other adults were present who had the skills to detect a possible fire or other emergency.  He did relent and hand over the phone. I was truly grateful that he doesn’t have a personal cell phone, or the next sound I’d likely hear would be our doorbell, rung by a local police officer.

A side note here… our name is probably on the “list” of 9-1-1 prank callers. We have had this happen more than once. On the off chance that Nick might still waiver, I took the upstairs base phone off the hook.

The fans and doors seem to increase the smoke detectors activity. Each time things calmed down and we’d breathe a sigh of relief…shrill squawks would again fill the air. Eventually the air cleared of the stimulus and silence prevailed. But wait, now a different beep was heard, the low battery signals. This extra activity had depleted the 9 volt back up battery in two of the units.

This was an easy fix. The ladder and some fresh batteries were all I needed. The situation seemed well in hand as my husband dashed out of the door and backed the car out of our garage.  I waved and silently prayed that he was able to catch the last bus downtown.

The ladder is called Little Giant, but a Big Brain is required to set it up. If that brain belongs to engineering major who’s of a brawny build, so much the better! I wrestled the Little Giant® MegaLite™ Aluminum Ladder out of its storage spot and into the house. “Lite” in the name surely doesn’t mean the physical weight of the ladder.

The brochure (which was nowhere to be found at that moment) says how versatile and easy it is to use. One can configure it to just about any position, like reaching the Smoke Detector mounted on an 18 foot high ceiling in my dining room.  I set up the ladder in the usual A-frame position. I use this ladder about twice a year, so the mechanism to change positions is a little dicey.  I simply could not get it into position to reach that unit located on the 18 foot ceiling.

All the while the random beeps from the low battery continue to drive us crazy. I’d yet to have a cup of coffee, the dogs had not been fed and the show’s last segment is now over. My son, who also hasn’t breakfasted either, heads upstairs. He announces, in case my ears were no longer working, that the smoke detector needs a new battery.

This was the exact moment I’d opened the drawer where our batteries are kept. A crunching sound from a crinkled, empty package, which once held 9 volt Duracell batteries, greeted my ears.

I was on the internet in a flash, Googling: “Handy Man” in Edmonds, WA.  Twenty five minutes later my knight in shining armor, actually clad in jeans and a sweatshirt, arrived to silence the squawks for good.  In no time he had properly aligned the settings and mounted the Little Giant ladder, now stretched to its full height. The joy of not hearing the beeps was short-lived.

My knight on the shining ladder determined that the unit doesn’t just need a battery, it needs to new, as in be replaced with a new unit. The expiration date on this particular one is 2011…oops!

I mentally schedule a stop at the local Home Depot into my rounds for the day. My list included 9 volt batteries.

Much later, I sat down to write this post. I marveled at how our happy high; seeing Nick as the star of the segment on TV this morning, crashed into the reality of daily living on the spectrum.

Just when I thought it was safe to get back in the water…

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Not the “good” towels!

Living on the Spectrum, PMS (and it's not the medical one), , ,

“No way!”

I leveled what I hoped was a stern enough look at my husband to convey the seriousness of my message.

“What?” he looked genuinely puzzled as he stopped in his tracks.

“No way… are you going to use my brand new pale yellow tea towel to scrub the windows on the deck outside. That is WHAT!”

My trip to Europe this past spring had presented me with many opportunities to support the various local economies I visited.  I’d made space in my already bulging suitcases for these lovely pale yellow linens, purchased in the gift shop at Keukenhof Tulip Gardens in Holland. The design, crafted and woven in Holland, depicted cheeses created by the weave of the fine cotton fabric. Wiping down grime on the deck door outside windows would certainly to ruin that look with indelible stains.

I plead temporary insanity for actually putting the linens on the towel rack in the kitchen. I’d forgotten previous life lessons around males and their utter lack of understanding regarding the use of cleaning apparatus. The universe was providing me with yet another reminder.  This was after all, the same man who’d used the leaf blower to clean up construction mess during our flooring replacement project.

Guys just don’t get it!  It must be genetic. They all seem to have no clue that grabbing the first handy thing to do a grimy job is not the best choice.  They totally ignore the bins of “cleaning rags” that are placed strategically in the same cupboard with the cleaning solutions.

My brother used my brand new champagne gold bath towels to dry off his 1965 Ford Fairlane sedan. This vehicle had spent many years in the Arizona sun. The towel was forever stained with the oxidized teal colored paint that came off with every swipe of the drying towel.

My husband has made a career out of ruining his “good” clothes by refusing to change out of work attire when his attention is sucked into the vortex of a particular gross, nasty mess that demands his immediate attention. This same very manly male has been observed polishing the wood floors of our home by twirling about like a figure skater, in his stocking clad feet!

He claims the dogs do a lot of damage to his socks. In fact I’ve heard the phase “How did they get these anyway?” so frequently that it has become a family joke. The floor of his corner of our walk in closet is littered with discarded stockings. I know from his basketball playing days that if he chose, he’d make a perfect shot every time. Maybe a hoop needs to be installed above his hamper.  I purchase his Merino Wool socks in bulk 6-packs at Costco to counter this abuse.

A recent gag gift for my husband was a pair of Evriholder® Slipper Genie for Men. For the uninitiated these are open toe slippers with microfiber fingers on the bottoms that catch hair, dust and dirt; just walking around the house. He thought they were a hoot but I’ve only seen him use them the one time and they disappeared into his home office, never to be seen again. The good part is that he has ceased scrubbing the floors in his stocking feet.

I recently fished them out of his “junk box” from under the desk… I have them handy just in case the sock-skating starts up again!

Back to the towel issue, I recall reading a confession from a similar minded woman regarding protecting the guest towels in her powder room. In preparation for her bridge group’s arrival that next day, she had scoured that sink and spiffed up the area by hanging some of her cute hand towels. As a precaution against the unlikely event that one of her guys would utilize this particular facility, she’d pinned a note to the towels. It read “Don’t you dare touch these with your grubby dirty hands, Mom.” Of course you know she forgot to remove the note much to the amusement of the card playing gals. My friend still gets kidded about her guest towels!

I can’t use notes…my guys do NOT read them. Even on bright colored paper, placed strategically in the center of a completely empty counter top. I will still get inquiries, via phone that could be answered if they’d just read the note!

I do get my revenge. Every once in a while one of my husband’s favorite ratty old T-shirts is “lost in the wash”. After all some clean up jobs are just so ugly one has to throw away the rags when finished.

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Binoculars, Golf Clubs or PC’s?

Living on the Spectrum, , ,

What do Binoculars, Golf Clubs and PC computers have in common? Well they are all part of any given conversation with my Dad.

My sense of enjoyment for all things in nature, I got this from my father. A graduate of Oregon State, he spent several summers working as a fire watch; climbing up into the lookout towers of the forests near Corvallis. He definitely had plenty of time to hone his skills, identifying many birds not just by sight but by their calls. He graduated with a degree in Forestry and went back home to Indiana. He paused there just long enough to enlist in the US Air Force. He eventually wound up at Luke Air Force Base in Glendale, AZ. He met my mother, married and his first child (me) was born before his obligation of service was finished. He packed us all into the car, even my Mom’s parakeet and we headed back to Indiana for a visit, but never left! His desire to work as a Forest Ranger was not as strong as his desire to be near his family of farmers with their roots planted deep in the Midwest.

His years of college education did not go to waste. Using an old telescope he’d purchased at some farm sale or possibly an “Antique Shop”…we’d crouch in the brush waiting to spot some of the avian life that populated our area. I soon learned the difference between a Hairy Woodpecker and the Downy variety…and many others in that family. I learned the calls of so many birds as we patiently waiting to see the feathered features, lured by their sweet greetings.

Eventually the old telescope was replaced with some decent binoculars, but the joy of spotting a rare bird or even old familiar friends each season, was always part of my relationship with my Dad.

Of course as I grew a bit older the thrill of spotting a Purple Martin was replaced by seeing the cute boy up the road that I’d hoped would ask me to dance. His house was within range of the scope as well…and a much more interesting view for an adolescent female.

As I reached college age, I used my father’s lack of participation in his chosen field to ridicule him. He’d been terribly disappointed that I had not accepted a work scholarship to the University of Arizona. I told him I had “no idea” what I wanted to do just yet and did not want to “waste the funds.” When he pressed me, I took the cheap shot. I reminded him that he had not exactly used the four years he’d spent at Oregon State to any great purpose. Unless he considered dragging his daughter out to sit and get eaten alive by mosquitoes, while watching for some weird birds he was chasing, as good use of his tuition money.

That did end the discussion and put a damper on our relations for a bit as well.

My father has been not the most communicative parent. I usually call him and our phone conversations revolve around my latest new bird sighting or how the weather is affecting his golf game, but mostly about computer issues. My siblings and I joke about the fact that to keep our father on the phone for more than a few minutes, we have to talk on a subject related to computer programs! If we call with a real problem to be solved, Dad will spend hours; tirelessly searching the Microsoft pages and emails us with suggested solutions.

Dad’s growing passion for computing and all things related eclipsed his desire to watch birds. He quite literally began on the ground floor of his local bank’s launch of computerization. I remember seeing the first UNIVAC type computers at his bank. With two big drives on the top, looking like some sort of gigantic robot eyes, they were a bit daunting!

Dad was so proud when he took all of us downtown to the main bank to see these marvels in person. The units were so large, that only one section at a time could be brought up to the Data Processing floor in the elevator. They were all behind glass, in a special air-conditioned room too. Only the key punch station and a small monitor were out in the main area. This was in 1964 and was only the beginning of a romance with hardware and software that lasted the rest of his working career and on into his retirement years.

 

A small local bank was where he wound up working when he decided to stay put and live close to the place he’d been born. Eventually a move to a larger bank, in a bigger town, enabled Dad to attend the NCR computer school in nearby Dayton, Ohio. He had a clear aptitude. Dad’s enthusiasm for learning kept him alert enough to make the drive back home in one piece too. He did confess to hanging his head out the window of his VW Bug, using the cold night air to keep awake during the wee hours, after his training classes in the evenings.

I remember playing with Dad’s programming templates and drawing tools. I thought the plastic shapes were interesting. I would trace around the curlicues and odd shapes to create some truly unusual art that could rival some of Picasso’s work during his Cubism period. My dad seemed to prefer the water colors and oil paintings of his mother’s work. He suggested maybe I would benefits from study with her a bit during the summer.

While I did spend time painting with Grandma, one of my summers was spent at the 2nd National Bank of Richmond, Indiana doing keypunch work.

To earn some spending money and probably to keep me out of trouble too, my Dad arranged for me to do some data entry a few days a week. While my girlfriend donned a Dairy Delight T-shirt, slightly stained with cherry sundae mix, I got to dress up my nice Bobbie Brooks outfits and work at the bank. This air of sophistication gave me such a thrill I didn’t mind the monotony of typing names and addresses into the punch cards that would update the computer records of the banks’ customers.

Dad’s love of computers knows no boundaries! On a visit to my home in Arizona one winter I knew that he’d turned a corner, when instead of his golf bag, he’d brought his “Ozzie”!

Dad’s  first portable was the Osborne 1, which  featured a 5 inch (127 mm) 52-column display, two floppy-disk drives, a Z80 microprocessor, 64k of RAM, and could fit under an airplane seat. It could survive being accidentally dropped and included a bundled software package that included the CP/M operating system, the BASIC programming language, the WordStar word processing package, and the Super Calc spreadsheet program. He proceeded to share all of this with me and anyone else he could con into sitting by his side while he demonstrated this marvel.

Suddenly I was back in my childhood sitting with my dad, but at a desk, not on a tree stump. I heard a familiar humming sound, but it was from a machine not the little Ruby-throated birds or pesky insects circling in close to suckle my blood. My attention span stretched to the max as I struggled to keep up with all I was seeing and hearing.  The only thing missing was the itchy mosquito bites!

In my second pass at college I discovered Apple computer products!  My Dad and I were now on separate paths. He preferred PC computers that would allow him to tinker around with their code and programming… My Macintosh offered no such opportunity.

Conversations during this phase of our lives were shorter due to the limitations on subject matter outside the realm of DOS programming. Fortunately Windows replaced the PC operating systems. When I out grew my old Mac, it was replaced with a new IBM PC that ran Windows programs! Dad was back in the role of being my personal computer support person. On more than one occasion he did walk me through some tricky spots and get me back in business quickly.

Until recently I never appreciated just how much I retained from my early years “bird watching” with my dad. Moving to the Pacific Northwest has provided me with a veritable bird sanctuary right in my own back yard.

I am excited to call my Dad and regale him with my sighting of a Pileated woodpecker chipping away on the Alder tree outside my bedroom window. Our computer discussions now involve a discussion of whether or not he will install the latest Windows operating system on any of his computers. He has several machines and still enjoys tinkering around with them. But at the age of 85 he has other concerns. Like whether or not he will endure this new chemo therapy or just let nature run its course.

Happy Birthday Dad, I love you! And I hope we will have many more conversations. Any topic will be fine too…birds, golf, the weather or even the latest computer article you just read.

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And the winner is…..

Living on the Spectrum, ,

“Who won the mail contest today?”…. this is a phone call from my Hubby, on his way home via the local transit bus, too anxious to wait to hear the news.

This is not about the big manila Reader’s Digest Sweepstakes envelopes that declare “You may have won $100,000!”  Our contest has evolved from a simple task of our son’s; bringing in the mail each day.

Our middle son still lives at home, due to his visual and mental disabilities. He is very helpful around the house and loves to have jobs to do as a member of our family. Skills that he is able to perform are incorporated into his daily routine. These give him a sense of purpose and worth as a capable person, even if he is not able to live independently.

Our blind son is amazing at sorting the laundry! He can easily identify his own T-shirts, socks and underwear from that of his dad or his brother. He is occasionally undone by the colorful bandanas that I wear around my forehead to collect sweat during workouts. They are the same shape, size and weight of cotton as his white men’s handkerchiefs.

Other daily help includes loading or unloading the dish washer, taking out the trash from each room to the big wheeled cart that goes to the curb each Tuesday morning at 7:00am. He knows which day of the month includes the recycling too. His favorite part of this particular task is “reminding” his father to take the containers out to the curb. I love that part too… as it takes me out of the wifely role of “nagging” my Hubby to do this step!

Autism sometimes presents a challenge to the individual, kind of like an itch to be scratched or an impulse that just cannot be ignored. Such is the case with our son. He cannot abide a change in routine or schedule. He is not happy when someone else performs one of his assigned jobs. Even though the intention is to be helpful, he may become agitated and seemingly ungrateful. When we have visitors or family members that stay at our home we are careful to let them know which jobs our son considers to be his domain, so that harmony is maintained.

As an exercise in improving his mobility skills we taught him the route to and from our mail box which is located across the street and down a few houses. This is a daily task and involves locating the box, unlocking it with a key and bringing all the mail back home. My Hubby decided to make this more exciting by creating a contest scenario. Each day our son brings in the mail and Hubby reads off the address labels on each of the envelopes. Jointly addressed items to not count for the total to “win” the day’s final tally; only individually addressed labels count. Also excluded are labels bearing the title of “occupant” “homeowner at this address” or “resident”. The contest does include packages including those from Fed X or UPS, in addition to ones delivered by the US Post.

I truly believe that Hubby gets quite the kick out of his game too. It has evolved to the point that phone calls are executed when either he is out of town or our son is on the road traveling to a music gig. Some days Hubby is so eager to see “who won” that he will meet our son at the door or even in the driveway, not willing to wait until he enters the house to tally up the count of recipients.

Hubby makes such a big fuss when he doesn’t win that now our son roots for him to get the highest number of pieces each day. For some reason many of the utility bills are addressed to me alone. I am also the major recipient of catalogs and all of my business mail comes to our home address, so I am frequently the winner, much to the disappointment of the guys in the family.

Grandma visited a few times and observed that her son (my Hubby) was not winning the mail contest very often. She vowed to send him more letters when she returned home, to help his numbers in the final mail count! She may have even enlisted some of the other family members. Hubby was delighted by birthday greetings from some of the distant relatives who were suddenly anxious to communicate with their nephew or cousin after all these years.

I secretly think his agreements with many of the phone solicitations for the Red Cross, Heart Association and various other funding raising type outreach; are seen as a way to pad his daily mail count.  We can never move from this house address! We have received enough “contribution gifts” of beautifully decorated address labels, in Hubby’s name of course, to last us for the rest of our lives.

Hubby has even subscribed to a few magazines recently! Who knew that men like to read the Ladies Home Journal? Hubby swears they have some great recipes. I think these new subscriptions are part of his “recipe “to ensure that he wins the mail contest as frequently as possible.

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